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The thing you're missing here is that these two statements are not contradictory: -- CS grads are, on average, better programmers than non-CS-grads. -- The av

The thing you're missing here is that these two statements are not contradictory: -- CS grads are, on average, better programmers than non-CS-grads. -- The average CS grad is not a very good programmer. My company does a standardized interview with a straightforward coding problem that is only a few steps above fizzbuzz level. In just the past few weeks, we've had candidates who: -- Had to look up basic syntax (defining a function) in the language they chose. -- Duplicated a reference a few minutes in and could not figure out the problem in the remaining twenty minutes. -- Couldn't extract the 2nd element of an array of five elements. These same candidates, on other portions of the interview: -- Knew nothing about common data structures (something that at the very least a CS degree should help with) -- Couldn't handle an intermediate SQL query fix involving a simple normalized schema -- Couldn't tell you anything about internals or security, and -- Didn't seem able to describe how they'd build a CRUD app. All of these candidates had CS degrees from respectable-to-good universities. Anecdotes are not data, but high-level data says the same thing. Our coding problem is very similar to the practice problem shown at [1] (though slightly harder). It doesn't require any tricky lateral thinking, deep language features, esoteric algorithms, dynamic programming, weird race conditions, or any of the other usual trivia BS - it's as straightforward a task as we could design. And if you look at how much progress people make (see [2]), it's not much. The vast majority of people we interview have CS degrees, and two-thirds of them still get ~nowhere. Meanwhile, the best interview we've done this month was with a guy who has been the sole developer for an ag business in rural Arkansas for the past decade. He has no degree and his previous two jobs were a sandwich shop and running a website for his church. (Specific details slightly fudged for the sake of candidate anonymity, but not in a way that materially affects the point.) [1] https://www.otherbranch.com/shared/practice-coding-problem https://www.otherbranch.com/shared/practice-coding-problem [2] https://ibb.co/CpznhK8m https://ibb.co/CpznhK8m

hirvi74 1y ago
I have a degree in computer science, and I have been a professional full-stack developer for almost 9 years. I could probably not solve the problem in your first link in 25 minutes. I know exactly how I would solve it, conceptually and what data structures I would use, but I am not sure I'd get the adjacent mines part correct on the first attempt. Then again, this is nothing like the type of problems I work on a daily basis.
- AnonHP 1y ago
  (Not GP) After looking at the page and the problem description, I agree. The time limit of 25 minutes is way too short for this considering that the person may already be stressed and find it difficult to understand that big wall of requirements and implement it in this time span. It doesn’t matter if one is a self taught programmer or has a CS degree. I don’t know if they’re looking for superheroes or people who can put in the work. If the GP is reading this, I’d suggest increasing the timer a lot more (like one hour, what’s the big deal anyway?) and splitting the requirement and steps into smaller chunks. The “optimize for speed” remark in the instructions is also a bit confusing.
  - userbinator 1y ago
    I respectfully disagree that this problem needs anywhere close to an hour; and having the problem already broken down into rather simple steps is a significant amount of handholding. As for being stressed -- if this is too much, how will you do when asked to solve even harder problems with tight schedules and/or demanding customers?
    - 9rx 1y ago
      > if this is too much, how will you do when asked to solve even harder problems with tight schedules and/or demanding customers? Isn't the whole reason you are joining a team is so that you have a support network when such situations arise? The period of acting alone to join that team is a temporary aberration and is to be recognized as such. You may as well be the business selling to those demanding customers if you have what it takes to handle going at it alone. It will be far more profitable. But if you don't have it...
      - userbinator 1y ago
        Not if the team expects you to pull your own weight, because they will be busy doing the same.
        1y ago
userbinator 1y ago
It's results like this which put to rest the "myth" that "10x" programmers don't exist according to some people. In fact, it's been my experience that "100x" or even "1000x" programmers exist. (Fabrice Bellard is a prominent example of the latter.) For your given practice problem I'd probably spend more time reading it and writing the code than thinking, unless I'm asked to use something like an APL-family language in which case the majority of the time would be spent reading the problem description. (Full-disclosure: mostly self-taught with several decades of experience.)
- typewithrhythm 1y ago
  Depends, maybe Its more a matter of description, but I would call the lowest quality engineer I've seen employed a "0.1x" engineer, before I would describe a good one as a 10x. Just because it's a kind of visualisation of a distribution, the elite are not that far ahead of the competent, but there is a very long tail of shitters out there.
  - bluecalm 1y ago
    Now take that good one and compare them to a guy like Thibault Duplessis (Lichess author), look at his GitHub and commit history for Lichess and you will quickly realize that even with your 0.1x starting point 1000x engineers are out there. The guy single handedly created the best online chess site out there outperforming whole commercial teams in every area (performance, interface, features, whatever you choose). His work ethic is legendary and he pays himself below entry level salary (for US standards).
- MichaelRo 1y ago
  Compared to someone who's basically a zero in programming, any amount of knowledge pushes the ratio to infinity. The average CS graduate doesn't know shit because universities need volume to survive so basically once in, you are spitted out eventually. And faking projects and cheating on exams is rampant, with the complicit involvement of teaching stuff because they don't care and incentives are biased towards turning a blind eye. So 90% of CS graduates are useless, which it why, thank God, the inflationary pressure towards programmer jobs is far lower than the droves of new arrivals would suggest. Therefore the top 10% are 100x by default compared to the middle because the middle is really a liberal arts graduate, not a computer programmer.
WalterBright 1y ago
Computer science isn't about building CRUD apps or SQL queries. Just like mechanical engineering isn't about operating a milling machine.
- s5300 1y ago
  [dead]
nobodyandproud 1y ago
I wish I were home, so that I can code and time myself for the fun. Alas, it’ll be a few weeks and by that time I’ll have forgotten :)
ben_w 1y ago
> [1] https://www.otherbranch.com/shared/practice-coding-problem https://www.otherbranch.com/shared/practice-coding-problem Minesweeper? Huh. No wonder the PhD candidate who was supervising us was surprised I did that as a fun little side project in my first or second year at university. Still, I'm not absolutely sure I'd have gotten to the end of step 5 (correctly working flood-fill) within 25 minutes despite having implemented the whole game in Java, REALBasic, and JavaScript over the years. On the other hand, that's probably good. 25 minute coding challenge where you're not even expected to get to the end as per the instructions* is much better than "take this, do it over the next week, might take you 8 hours, we'll spend an hour talking about it" as I've been seeing. * "Very few people will finish the full problem. You do not need to complete every step to pass our interview."
radicalbyte 1y ago
That matches my experience: but it's to be expected as most CS degrees are applied Math not Software Engineering. You have to respect that. The thing which makes SEs good is being smart and having passion. Self-taught selects for that. For young people, take a smart young person and put them through a CS degree whilst working. They'll be instantly productive and with a little guidance can be successful. Over time they become exceptional. That was my path.
- clmckinley 1y ago
  This was my first thought when i read the headline. Many people were told to get CS degrees because they will get a job, not because they love it. The cost of quitting a degree or not using a "valuable" degree is relatively high, especially for people who are inclined to coast. Most people who start college also graduate, even if they aren't prepared or love their program, so we have lots of bad cs graduates. On the other hand, most people I know have at least dabbled in learning to code. In this case the cost of quitting is very low and the cost of getting good is reasonably high, so it self-selects for people who excel at it and love it. That said, if you only compare people with similar aptitudes, my experience is that people with formal training are better. tl;dr: The most important thing to me is comparing past work, interview and personality. If you have a CS degree with no personal projects, you won't get a job offer. If you don't have a degree but have active projects with good code then I don't care if you have a degree. That said, I have been getting hundreds of applications for every entry level job I post so I can normally find someone who has both.
t_mahmood 1y ago
Where can I get more of these small programming challenges? I love small problems like this. I couldn't get all the steps in 25 minutes, but I think I was not that bad. (I was in stage 4 before time ended, got distracted about taking input with Rust, heh) I think, working with these small problems would give my ADHD brain a boost before I start my daily works. If more detailed problem, I would spend the whole day on it, smaller would not give me much push. This was just right!

hirvi74 1y ago

I have a degree in computer science, and I have been a professional full-stack developer for almost 9 years. I could probably not solve the problem in your first link in 25 minutes. I know exactly how I would solve it, conceptually and what data structures I would use, but I am not sure I'd get the adjacent mines part correct on the first attempt. Then again, this is nothing like the type of problems I work on a daily basis.

AnonHP 1y ago
(Not GP) After looking at the page and the problem description, I agree. The time limit of 25 minutes is way too short for this considering that the person may already be stressed and find it difficult to understand that big wall of requirements and implement it in this time span. It doesn’t matter if one is a self taught programmer or has a CS degree. I don’t know if they’re looking for superheroes or people who can put in the work. If the GP is reading this, I’d suggest increasing the timer a lot more (like one hour, what’s the big deal anyway?) and splitting the requirement and steps into smaller chunks. The “optimize for speed” remark in the instructions is also a bit confusing.
- userbinator 1y ago
  I respectfully disagree that this problem needs anywhere close to an hour; and having the problem already broken down into rather simple steps is a significant amount of handholding. As for being stressed -- if this is too much, how will you do when asked to solve even harder problems with tight schedules and/or demanding customers?
  - 9rx 1y ago
    > if this is too much, how will you do when asked to solve even harder problems with tight schedules and/or demanding customers? Isn't the whole reason you are joining a team is so that you have a support network when such situations arise? The period of acting alone to join that team is a temporary aberration and is to be recognized as such. You may as well be the business selling to those demanding customers if you have what it takes to handle going at it alone. It will be far more profitable. But if you don't have it...
    - userbinator 1y ago
      Not if the team expects you to pull your own weight, because they will be busy doing the same.
      - 1y ago

userbinator 1y ago

It's results like this which put to rest the "myth" that "10x" programmers don't exist according to some people. In fact, it's been my experience that "100x" or even "1000x" programmers exist. (Fabrice Bellard is a prominent example of the latter.) For your given practice problem I'd probably spend more time reading it and writing the code than thinking, unless I'm asked to use something like an APL-family language in which case the majority of the time would be spent reading the problem description. (Full-disclosure: mostly self-taught with several decades of experience.)

typewithrhythm 1y ago
Depends, maybe Its more a matter of description, but I would call the lowest quality engineer I've seen employed a "0.1x" engineer, before I would describe a good one as a 10x. Just because it's a kind of visualisation of a distribution, the elite are not that far ahead of the competent, but there is a very long tail of shitters out there.
- bluecalm 1y ago
  Now take that good one and compare them to a guy like Thibault Duplessis (Lichess author), look at his GitHub and commit history for Lichess and you will quickly realize that even with your 0.1x starting point 1000x engineers are out there. The guy single handedly created the best online chess site out there outperforming whole commercial teams in every area (performance, interface, features, whatever you choose). His work ethic is legendary and he pays himself below entry level salary (for US standards).
MichaelRo 1y ago
Compared to someone who's basically a zero in programming, any amount of knowledge pushes the ratio to infinity. The average CS graduate doesn't know shit because universities need volume to survive so basically once in, you are spitted out eventually. And faking projects and cheating on exams is rampant, with the complicit involvement of teaching stuff because they don't care and incentives are biased towards turning a blind eye. So 90% of CS graduates are useless, which it why, thank God, the inflationary pressure towards programmer jobs is far lower than the droves of new arrivals would suggest. Therefore the top 10% are 100x by default compared to the middle because the middle is really a liberal arts graduate, not a computer programmer.

WalterBright 1y ago

Computer science isn't about building CRUD apps or SQL queries. Just like mechanical engineering isn't about operating a milling machine.

s5300 1y ago
[dead]

nobodyandproud 1y ago

I wish I were home, so that I can code and time myself for the fun. Alas, it’ll be a few weeks and by that time I’ll have forgotten :)

ben_w 1y ago

> [1] https://www.otherbranch.com/shared/practice-coding-problem https://www.otherbranch.com/shared/practice-coding-problem Minesweeper? Huh. No wonder the PhD candidate who was supervising us was surprised I did that as a fun little side project in my first or second year at university. Still, I'm not absolutely sure I'd have gotten to the end of step 5 (correctly working flood-fill) within 25 minutes despite having implemented the whole game in Java, REALBasic, and JavaScript over the years. On the other hand, that's probably good. 25 minute coding challenge where you're not even expected to get to the end as per the instructions* is much better than "take this, do it over the next week, might take you 8 hours, we'll spend an hour talking about it" as I've been seeing. * "Very few people will finish the full problem. You do not need to complete every step to pass our interview."

radicalbyte 1y ago

That matches my experience: but it's to be expected as most CS degrees are applied Math not Software Engineering. You have to respect that. The thing which makes SEs good is being smart and having passion. Self-taught selects for that. For young people, take a smart young person and put them through a CS degree whilst working. They'll be instantly productive and with a little guidance can be successful. Over time they become exceptional. That was my path.

clmckinley 1y ago
This was my first thought when i read the headline. Many people were told to get CS degrees because they will get a job, not because they love it. The cost of quitting a degree or not using a "valuable" degree is relatively high, especially for people who are inclined to coast. Most people who start college also graduate, even if they aren't prepared or love their program, so we have lots of bad cs graduates. On the other hand, most people I know have at least dabbled in learning to code. In this case the cost of quitting is very low and the cost of getting good is reasonably high, so it self-selects for people who excel at it and love it. That said, if you only compare people with similar aptitudes, my experience is that people with formal training are better. tl;dr: The most important thing to me is comparing past work, interview and personality. If you have a CS degree with no personal projects, you won't get a job offer. If you don't have a degree but have active projects with good code then I don't care if you have a degree. That said, I have been getting hundreds of applications for every entry level job I post so I can normally find someone who has both.

t_mahmood 1y ago

Where can I get more of these small programming challenges? I love small problems like this. I couldn't get all the steps in 25 minutes, but I think I was not that bad. (I was in stage 4 before time ended, got distracted about taking input with Rust, heh) I think, working with these small problems would give my ADHD brain a boost before I start my daily works. If more detailed problem, I would spend the whole day on it, smaller would not give me much push. This was just right!