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The "invert a binary tree" thing is a reference to a tweet by Max Howell [1] where he complains that he didn't get hired by Google even though he wrote Homebrew

by rafram 2y ago

The "invert a binary tree" thing is a reference to a tweet by Max Howell [1] where he complains that he didn't get hired by Google even though he wrote Homebrew, which he estimates 90% of their engineers use. Howell describes himself as a "dick" [2], hadn't been involved with the Homebrew project for years, and has since gone on to write the NFT-based package manager Tea [3] and pkgx [4], which is an "everything app"-style CLI tool with lots of fever-dream AI art and RCE as a feature. It's possible that Google just didn't hire him because he wasn't a good candidate. [1]: https://x.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768 https://x.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768 [2]: https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-logic-behind-Google-rejecting-Max-Howell-the-author-of-Homebrew-for-not-being-able-to-invert-a-binary-tree/answer/Max-Howell https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-logic-behind-Google-rejectin... [3]: https://tea.xyz/ https://tea.xyz/ [4]: https://pkgx.dev/ https://pkgx.dev/

SXX 2y ago
This wasn't the only story like that. I at least remember similar stories about some kind of database / library maintainer and yet another javascript framework. Dont have enough time to find them now, but it's kind a obvious people would like to apply to places that already use their open source code. I would at least try, but no one use open source game-clone engines so no way on earth anyone will use what I worked on.
- spcebar 2y ago
  Conversely, a story from the opposite end of the extreme: Fresh out of college I got an interview at a company that made games. It was exactly what I wanted to do and I made it miraculously far given the fact that I had zero real world experience. I made it to round three but ultimately got rejected. Who did they hire instead? A friend who works at the company later told me that it was down to two candidates. It was me vs the guy who wrote the game engine they make all their games in.
bluedino 2y ago
Did he tell the interviewer that? Or did he just expect him to have known? I have had maybe two interviewers ever mention anything on my GitHub, which I usually include on my application/resume.

by rafram 2y ago

SXX 2y ago

This wasn't the only story like that. I at least remember similar stories about some kind of database / library maintainer and yet another javascript framework. Dont have enough time to find them now, but it's kind a obvious people would like to apply to places that already use their open source code. I would at least try, but no one use open source game-clone engines so no way on earth anyone will use what I worked on.

spcebar 2y ago
Conversely, a story from the opposite end of the extreme: Fresh out of college I got an interview at a company that made games. It was exactly what I wanted to do and I made it miraculously far given the fact that I had zero real world experience. I made it to round three but ultimately got rejected. Who did they hire instead? A friend who works at the company later told me that it was down to two candidates. It was me vs the guy who wrote the game engine they make all their games in.

bluedino 2y ago

Did he tell the interviewer that? Or did he just expect him to have known? I have had maybe two interviewers ever mention anything on my GitHub, which I usually include on my application/resume.