141–150 of 489 posts
"15% dislike academic CS (and think that talking about CS is a sign that a candidate will not be productive)" That seems really weird. Academic CS isn't really necessary for most programming jobs, but I can't see how it would ever be a detriment.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If I'm already employed, it be weird to take a week off just to work for another company. Also ramp up time takes at least a day or two. This whole process seems troublesome for both the employee and employer
When did you last switch jobs? I recently went through a round of employment where I quit my job at the beginning. Between updating my resume/social networks, brushing up on academic CS, finding leads, scheduling interviews and follow-up interviews and managing/negotiating offers, it was absolutely a full-time job. I can't imagine finding a new programming job while still working at the old job.
From my experience of hiring people and looking for a job myself, this is the exception.
The sad reality of programming interviews is that it's absolutely necessary to ask several near-trivial questions in order to flush out the candidates with awesome resumes and impressive degrees who simply have no idea how to analyze a simple problem and solve it using a computer. Lately, I've been asking "given the starting and ending times of two calendar appointments, determine whether or not they conflict." No lo…
> given the starting and ending times of two calendar appointments, determine whether or not they conflict. Say the first appointment goes from a to b and the second goes from c to d . What does it look like if the appointments _don't_ conflict? This happens just when one appointment ends no later than the other begins; in other words, when b ≤ c or d ≤ a . So, the appointments conflict just when not( b ≤ c or d ≤ a…
You're saving a few characters to make the code less obvious. Please correct me if there's some other benefit.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When did you last switch jobs? I recently went through a round of employment where I quit my job at the beginning. Between updating my resume/social networks, brushing up on academic CS, finding leads, scheduling interviews and follow-up interviews and managing/negotiating offers, it was absolutely a full-time job. I can't imagine finding a new programming job while still working at the old job.
I think this is a crazy expectation. I last switched jobs while working at Apple last October. Having the BATNA of your current employment is crucial to the negotiation process and I can't imagine forgoing that- if you have no current income that's an insane bargaining handicap. Anyone with experience absolutely is not going to go for "quit your job, and maybe we'll give you a new one after a week, maybe it won't wor…
The sad reality of programming interviews is that it's absolutely necessary to ask several near-trivial questions in order to flush out the candidates with awesome resumes and impressive degrees who simply have no idea how to analyze a simple problem and solve it using a computer. Lately, I've been asking "given the starting and ending times of two calendar appointments, determine whether or not they conflict." No lo…
I think the best part of this is how many people are getting it wrong in the comments here or not fully thinking it through. Perhaps it's not as easy a question as you think it is in the heat of the moment during a stressful interview?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd say so. The "assuming time encoded"-bit is important though - I rather think starting with the data is valuable: Can I assume the times are in a sane date format/datatype? If not, start with e1 = toSaneDateFormat(endtime1), s2 = toSaneDateFormat(startime2) (Fill in if interviewer is interested). Then, as you say, a check for overlap is easy - but maybe one wants to be more fancy, like: if (timeDelta(e1, t2) At an…
This is a great example of why the OPs question could be a good or terrible interview question -- it's not clear if they want the obvious technical solution (comparing datetimes) or a wider discussion about "what is a date time and how is the data represented", "what are the real world / business implications", "here is existing technology using intervals that will solve it" etc as you mentioned. In my experience int…
After 1-2 technical phone screens, we send applicants a coding challenge for which they have 48 hours to complete. The coding challenge is representative of some of the work we do (e.g. Given our API, create a D3 visualization of X) and should take applicants several hours to complete.
In submissions we look at everything from overall program structure and approach to applicants' attention to detail and usage of good industry practices.
This coding challenge quickly weeds out applicants that interview well but code poorly and is an efficient way for us to see the quality of work we can expect from them (and conversely, the type of work they can expect to do with us).
After a successful challenge, we bring applicants in to meet the team. At this point, it's largely just about culture fit.
"15% dislike academic CS (and think that talking about CS is a sign that a candidate will not be productive)" That seems really weird. Academic CS isn't really necessary for most programming jobs, but I can't see how it would ever be a detriment.
I imagine they correlate an over interest in CS concepts with said group.
The sad reality of programming interviews is that it's absolutely necessary to ask several near-trivial questions in order to flush out the candidates with awesome resumes and impressive degrees who simply have no idea how to analyze a simple problem and solve it using a computer. Lately, I've been asking "given the starting and ending times of two calendar appointments, determine whether or not they conflict." No lo…
I think the best part of this is how many people are getting it wrong in the comments here or not fully thinking it through. Perhaps it's not as easy a question as you think it is in the heat of the moment during a stressful interview?
What I like about pklausler's example is that it allows for people to find edge cases without too much technical knowledge. If I have a candidate who doesn't ask about the inputs (e.g. "are the appointment sorted?"), I'd be wary. Engineers are often given vague specifications they need to clarify or account for.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not a programmer but wouldn't if (endtime[1] > starttime[2]){status=conflict} work? Assuming time is encoded in epoch format.
This is close but you need to ensure the start time is before the other ends, and test for the second one starting before the first also. There's four cases: [appointment 1 start] [1 end] [appointment 2 start] [2 end] (case 1 - no overlap, appointment 1 first) [appointment 1 start] [appointment 2 start] [1 end] [2 end] (case 2 - overlap, appointment 1 first) [appointment 2 start] [appointment 1 start] [2 end] [1 end]…