Re: open book, what I meant was "not expected to know" means something that they can't do blindfolded. For a Rails person making a contrived app from scratch do

Re: open book, what I meant was "not expected to know" means something that they can't do blindfolded. For a Rails person making a contrived app from scratch doesn't tell me anything other than they could type `rails foo` and run a few generators. What I mean is that, I put together a few challenges with APIs we work with (or gems we've written, that sort of thing) and have them solve a problem that will require them to use their innate ability, drive, and Google/StackOverflow/etc. to solve the problem. It's not something that they would be able to do without the internet. Does that make sense? The contract thing is tough, although at least in NYC the market is so tight that there's really no risk of unemployment, but yeah, we wouldn't do relo + contract. We'd start them off as remote and see if that worked. If so, then relo; it's risky risky for both parties (especially in NYC) that it's kinda crazy to expect either party to agree to it. The candidate has no idea what NYC is like, and the organization may be reluctant to fire a bad hire who just isn't fitting in because they feel bad. At least with a remote contract, no one has to move and we can see if we both like each other enough to get married. Then would come the offer + relo., or if it's not a good fit, end the contract (with 2 weeks notice at least). Finally, I'd say the initial screen is a bit light. We used to have about a 1-2 hr. technical Q&A followed by Fizzbuzz-style questions, but that had a low false-positive rate so we got rid of it. That is to say, the background work I did (googling them, stack overflow, github, twitter, their resume, etc.) was a pretty good filter at keeping out the obviously underqualified. However, I'm considering putting it back as it helped give me a more nuanced picture of the candidates that I end up doing as part of the contract, and it might help to have some first-impressions ahead of time (but I am always worried about false first impressions clouding my judgement).