3 ms·

100% agree. For a web position I have no idea why you would ask them to write a tree parser or binary search algorithm which I experienced not that long ago.

• weareconvo 13y ago
  Absolutely the best questions to ask in interviews, in my opinion, are open-ended questions. The problem with those, however, is that the interviewer himself has to know enough to be able to correctly judge whether the candidate's answer is a reasonable one. Not only that, there are fewer language barriers when asking some canned binary tree bullshit. So a Chinese programmer doing an interview who barely speaks English can still proudly ask the candidate some crap about Heapsort and feel like he's done his job well.
  • swivelmaster 13y ago
    I've had some good luck with open-ended questions like "Tell me about a time when you had to deal with a scaling issue." How they define "scaling issue" often says just as much as their explanation as to how they solved it. I think I've had to ask for clarification a few times due to the interviewee answering the open-ended question with something I wasn't familiar with, but that's an excellent opportunity to gauge their explanatory skills anyway!
• fooooobar 13y ago
  I don't even know what a tree parser is, but how can anyone not be able to write a binary search algorithm?
• typicalrunt 13y ago
  Asking about what happens at a low level when entering a URL however is a good question. Or perhaps asking how to do cross domain JSON requests etc... The former is a question about fundamentals, whereas the latter is a question about specific implementations. I agree that as a Web developer you should probably need to know what JSONP is, but it's also something that could be learned in about 5 minutes from Google. I like it when a phone interview is basically a conversation. I don't like Spanish Inquisition-style interviews, so I like to start with something and watch it lead to other things. Of course, if the conversation drops dead I can refer to my notes and ask another question. With regard to the URL question, in the past I have allowed the interviewee to answer the URL question as best they can, and the ask questions to cover some of the gaps, and these questions can lead into JSONP handling and its ilk. As an aside and a <rant type=small />, interviewing like this ensures that there is a natural flow and I'm keeping my interviewee's brain jumping between similar contexts. I hate it when I've been interviewed and I'm expected to context switch between algorithms (mergesort) to best practises (SOLID) to programming (implement REST with Jersey+Servlets). And this is all in a 30-60 minute "conversation".
  • jimmaswell 13y ago
    What happens when you enter a URL is just a specific implementation too. It's going to differ between operating systems, browsers, network setups..