Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
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Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
1–10 of 292 posts
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#2Maybe it's just me, but this seems to either miss the point of a CS interview, or makes a point about CS interviews containing pointless parts making them trivial. If an interview contains a known set of possible questions and you simply remember the answers, than in the end the whole exercise is somewhat pointless, isn't it?
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#3This is what I was afraid of. I always thought interviews were something where you present your abilities, experience and knowledge. It should not be something you "prepare" for because then you're not showing off your skills, instead you're just regurgitating what you are trained to do.
I do somewhat blame the whiteboard culture, but I guess that's the one that has given the best results so far. I've no doubt that it will change soon.
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#4Maybe it's just me, but this seems to either miss the point of a CS interview, or makes a point about CS interviews containing pointless parts making them trivial. If an interview contains a known set of possible questions and you simply remember the answers, than in the end the whole exercise is somewhat pointless, isn't it?
Yes, and there are a lot of HR that get cheated by simply remembering the answers.
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#5Maybe it's just me, but this seems to either miss the point of a CS interview, or makes a point about CS interviews containing pointless parts making them trivial. If an interview contains a known set of possible questions and you simply remember the answers, than in the end the whole exercise is somewhat pointless, isn't it?
Yes you are right. This is why I take some standard problems but change things a little bit so they have to think a bit. And I ask additional questions like how would you test this function, how to change improve performance, etc.
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#6Maybe it's just me, but this seems to either miss the point of a CS interview, or makes a point about CS interviews containing pointless parts making them trivial. If an interview contains a known set of possible questions and you simply remember the answers, than in the end the whole exercise is somewhat pointless, isn't it?
Yes. People who claim that typical interview processes test "coding" or "CS fundamentals" or "algorithmic thinking" or whatever basically have to face the fact that they've really been testing for a set of skills that's different from what's needed by a working programmer. If they were testing for the actual skills of a programmer, there wouldn't be a cottage industry of books and classes and training materials to learn how to do "interview coding".
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#7I know this has been said a billion times but the CS interview is bullshit. It's like asking a pianist to describe how they would play a composition on the white board.
I always thought that this is a good question to ask https://github.com/alex/what-happens-when but then again probably not for all roles. It's good because even if the interviewee has seen the question, you can really gauge how much they know.
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#8If a stanford CS degree doesn't otherwise prepare students properly for a tech interview, I'm going to wager it is the interview process that has a problem, not the stanford CS degree..
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#9This makes me very, very sad.
I will never subject one of my potential hires to this nonsense. These concepts are valuable and academically interesting, for sure, but for the practical kind of engineering that's done at most companies it's simply not needed. Either that or it's already implemented in a library.
What a waste of time.
Re: Stanford CS9: Problem-Solving for the CS Technical Interview
#10This is what I was afraid of. I always thought interviews were something where you present your abilities, experience and knowledge. It should not be something you "prepare" for because then you're not showing off your skills, instead you're just regurgitating what you are trained to do. I do somewhat blame the whiteboard culture, but I guess that's the one that has given the best results so far. I've no doubt that i…
The idea of having a whole class on how to solve interview whiteboard problems (a skill that is, at least where I work, not very relevant to doing your job) is terrifying.