4 ms·
I thought the more interesting thing was that they're spending time writing custom tokenizers, regex automatons and logging frameworks at all, just so it can be
by nvm0n2 3y ago
I thought the more interesting thing was that they're spending time writing custom tokenizers, regex automatons and logging frameworks at all, just so it can be in OCaml.
For the tokenizer they had three more obvious options:
1. Use a JavaScript lib and call it via FFI. Tokenization isn't a hard task.
2. Compile tiktoken to WASM and call it directly.
3. Stick with their Python server.
Writing a custom regex automaton in OCaml and then running it in the browser is surely the worst option. How does this make sense, outside of just arbitrarily writing more OCaml for the sake of it? The justification for not using their previous scheme is only that it's "grungy", without further explanation.
Every other project also seems to be like this. The justification for it boils down to nobody else using OCaml, so they need an intern army to reinvent all the wheels they're missing.
I mean, I'm sure the interns had fun and were paid well. But there's a post below by someone with a massive inferiority complex, stating that everyone is "objectively inferior" to the people at Jane Street. This post doesn't make me feel inferior, it makes me feel a sense of awe and wonder that Jane Street's traders are so profitable they can subsidise this kind of objectively excessive IT bloat. Even the author seems to recognize this, it says the post is by the guy who has "the dubious honor of having convinced the firm to start using OCaml".
- caddemon 3y agoThe primary purpose of an internship at most major companies is hiring - you can screen candidates much better before extending a full time offer and the candidates can also get a better read on how much they'd enjoy working there. Even the second order effect of drumming up hype for others to want to work there is probably more important to many internship programs than whatever the interns might tangibly produce. At least I can say for sure that people at Google aren't shy about how it takes a few months to get up to speed with internal tooling and not much is actually expected from a summer intern. But they built themselves into a brand on campuses, which became so mainstream there was a stupid movie made about how fun it is supposed to be to intern at Google. And as far as finance goes, trading interns aren't even legally allowed to trade, so I wouldn't be surprised if the culture surrounding internship at Jane Street just leans more heavily into this for SWEs as well.