4 ms·

Before I started refusing these, I did one that was an integration with the companies sdk. The sdk was broken! So I produced a minimum viable repro, wrote up

Before I started refusing these, I did one that was an integration with the companies sdk. The sdk was broken! So I produced a minimum viable repro, wrote up a bug report and even included an analysis of where the bug was. The company had the gall to still ask me to do a take home using the patched sdk! If your take home test is broken, stupid or not trivial to setup, it's not the applicant who is at fault.

pydry 4y ago
That's amazing. It's like a red flag made out of red flags.
swader999 4y ago
The hiring process works both ways. In this case they failed and you're time spent prevented a lot of future grief.
- swader999 4y ago
  OMG your.
Kwpolska 4y ago
While there exist companies that overdo it and expect weird things like that, I believe the majority of companies expect something simple — if you’re applying to be a <rolls dice> Rails backend developer, you would probably be asked to build some simple API with a couple endpoints. And if you are applying for that position, you should know how to set up Ruby (and you should probably have it installed on your laptop, even if you aren’t doing much coding outside of work/for fun/in open-source projects), install Rails, create an app, and write the simple endpoints. The OOP seems to be struggling with something like that (and “virtual environment” smells very Pythony to me — even though Python packaging is a trainwreck, someone applying for a Python job shouldn’t need 3+ hours to set things up for a simple project.)
sokoloff 4y ago
Sending a valid, minimal reproduction case in the highest possible score on the take-home in my book. The take home is designed to efficiently weed out the hopelessly unqualified (of which the applicant pool is unsurprisingly over-represented). You clearly passed that test and, by asking a second time, the company saved you a bunch of further wasted time.

pydry 4y ago

That's amazing. It's like a red flag made out of red flags.

swader999 4y ago

The hiring process works both ways. In this case they failed and you're time spent prevented a lot of future grief.

swader999 4y ago
OMG your.

Kwpolska 4y ago

While there exist companies that overdo it and expect weird things like that, I believe the majority of companies expect something simple — if you’re applying to be a <rolls dice> Rails backend developer, you would probably be asked to build some simple API with a couple endpoints. And if you are applying for that position, you should know how to set up Ruby (and you should probably have it installed on your laptop, even if you aren’t doing much coding outside of work/for fun/in open-source projects), install Rails, create an app, and write the simple endpoints. The OOP seems to be struggling with something like that (and “virtual environment” smells very Pythony to me — even though Python packaging is a trainwreck, someone applying for a Python job shouldn’t need 3+ hours to set things up for a simple project.)

sokoloff 4y ago

Sending a valid, minimal reproduction case in the highest possible score on the take-home in my book. The take home is designed to efficiently weed out the hopelessly unqualified (of which the applicant pool is unsurprisingly over-represented). You clearly passed that test and, by asking a second time, the company saved you a bunch of further wasted time.