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Loren wants to work at Airbnb

lorenburton.com

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Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#81

Post by drgath »

immad wrote: post #73
M1573RMU74710N wrote: post #69

Hey, I hate to be "that guy"...but since you're applying for a front-end job, here goes: - You're loading scripts in your head tag, and a crap-ton of them. At least some of these could be concat'd together. HTTP request carry a lot of overhead, so fewer is better. I bet at least some could be moved to the bottom as well, with some CSS/JS to avoid the dreaded Flash Of UnBehavioured Content. - In a similar vein, you're…

Its a one use website. I think if he had done all those things it would have been overkill.

There is no such thing as "overkill" when generating code that you hope will get you a job interview.

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#82

Post by SeoxyS »

M1573RMU74710N wrote: post #69

Hey, I hate to be "that guy"...but since you're applying for a front-end job, here goes: - You're loading scripts in your head tag, and a crap-ton of them. At least some of these could be concat'd together. HTTP request carry a lot of overhead, so fewer is better. I bet at least some could be moved to the bottom as well, with some CSS/JS to avoid the dreaded Flash Of UnBehavioured Content. - In a similar vein, you're…

Ever heard of premature optimization? Doing things like concatenating images into sprites and using css to display them is overkill for pretty much anything except Google's doodles. I also find it to be very inelegant.

Best practices is one thing. Overkill is another.

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#84

Post by M1573RMU74710N »

SeoxyS wrote: post #82
M1573RMU74710N wrote: post #69

Hey, I hate to be "that guy"...but since you're applying for a front-end job, here goes: - You're loading scripts in your head tag, and a crap-ton of them. At least some of these could be concat'd together. HTTP request carry a lot of overhead, so fewer is better. I bet at least some could be moved to the bottom as well, with some CSS/JS to avoid the dreaded Flash Of UnBehavioured Content. - In a similar vein, you're…

Ever heard of premature optimization? Doing things like concatenating images into sprites and using css to display them is overkill for pretty much anything except Google's doodles. I also find it to be very inelegant. Best practices is one thing. Overkill is another.

When I lock the door when I leave the house, I am not "prematurely optimizing" against burglaries. The lock is there, I just have to turn it. I'm expending a minimal amount of effort for a comparatively large payoff. When I spend 10,000$ on an alarm system to protect my 50$ stereo...that's prematurely optimizing.

Most of the stuff I'm talking about is the default. There are a million and one tools to handle this stuff for you...there's a couple switches to flip in your server config, etc. It's not like you have to go out of the way to do these things, you almost have to go out of the way not to.

I mean, this is a pretty simple page...and it has a loading screen that takes a couple seconds? Maybe implementing some of these best practices could take care of that.

Little effort, good payoff.

>I also find it to be very inelegant.

HTTP requests cost. Putting the images together and then selecting them with CSS is a very elegant solution to that problem IMHO. It's also very simple to do.

You're entitled to your opinion of course.

Anyway, if you want to impress a prospective employer, I think it's a good idea to try and impress instead of just doing the absolute minimum. (not saying that Loren didn't impress or slacked off..this thing is beautiful looking and well written, but I mean hypothetically if I was doing something like this I'd want to know I did the best possible job for the effort spent)

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#85

Post by rimantas »

SeoxyS wrote: post #82
M1573RMU74710N wrote: post #69

Hey, I hate to be "that guy"...but since you're applying for a front-end job, here goes: - You're loading scripts in your head tag, and a crap-ton of them. At least some of these could be concat'd together. HTTP request carry a lot of overhead, so fewer is better. I bet at least some could be moved to the bottom as well, with some CSS/JS to avoid the dreaded Flash Of UnBehavioured Content. - In a similar vein, you're…

Ever heard of premature optimization? Doing things like concatenating images into sprites and using css to display them is overkill for pretty much anything except Google's doodles. I also find it to be very inelegant. Best practices is one thing. Overkill is another.

If we are talking about throw-away project you are right. If we are talking about regular web site you are very wrong. 80-90% time of user waiting for the page to load is spent client side waiting till all resources are ready.

I'd recommend exactly the same things M1573RMU74710N did. If you want performant web site you should minimize the number of HTTP requests (hence concatenating .js and .css files, using image sprites and setting expires and cache-control headers to avoid 304 Not Modified), make sure that resources don't block while loading (hence move JS to the bottom), make sure resources are small (hence image optimization and gzipping).

This should not be "best-practices" these should be "that's-how-things-are-done". And the guy's page is an application for the front-end engineer positions — if I were him I'd make sure that my application page shows my best skills.

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#86

Post by paulnelligan »

M1573RMU74710N wrote: post #69

Hey, I hate to be "that guy"...but since you're applying for a front-end job, here goes: - You're loading scripts in your head tag, and a crap-ton of them. At least some of these could be concat'd together. HTTP request carry a lot of overhead, so fewer is better. I bet at least some could be moved to the bottom as well, with some CSS/JS to avoid the dreaded Flash Of UnBehavioured Content. - In a similar vein, you're…

I think this matters not. His imagination, initiative, and drive is what matters the most here IMHO.

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#88

Post by jrockway »

hugh3 wrote: post #45
Mz wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At which point, understated elegance will become the new rage.

Exactly. I'm ahead of the curve. Here's my cover letter. It's in twelve-point Times, motherfuckers!

My cover letter doesn't even specify a font. It's ASCII text.

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#89

Post by rudasn »

timr wrote: post #58
erikpukinskis wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If everyone did this, it wouldn't work. It would just raise the noise level. That's the beauty if it. Everyone can't do this, because it takes work . It's customized for the specific company, and that's the only reason they work. It's like a cover letter on crack. If he made one that didn't find AirBnb's visual style, that didn't include specific information about what makes him special for AirBnb, it wouldn't succee…

You've missed the point: The fact that someone did "work" doesn't mean that they're qualified. It just means that they're enthusiastic enough to make a website for a single employer. And that's great, but it's just the start of the whole hiring process. Once you get noticed, you also need to prove that you're a good engineer, employable, a culture fit, etc. The OP was (vaguely) implying that the success of this guy's…

> Once you get noticed, you also need to prove that you're a good engineer, employable, a culture fit, etc.

I agree, but doesn't all this effort show that the candidate is willing (and able) to go over the top for this particular company?

The billboard shows you got money. This website shows you got skills and time to "sacrifice" for this company.

Re: Loren wants to work at Airbnb

#90

Post by marcamillion »

M1573RMU74710N wrote: post #69

Hey, I hate to be "that guy"...but since you're applying for a front-end job, here goes: - You're loading scripts in your head tag, and a crap-ton of them. At least some of these could be concat'd together. HTTP request carry a lot of overhead, so fewer is better. I bet at least some could be moved to the bottom as well, with some CSS/JS to avoid the dreaded Flash Of UnBehavioured Content. - In a similar vein, you're…

You could have easily walked away from this comment.

Sure, it might not be 100% optimized...but does it matter, really ? He showed initiative, gumption, and creativity.

If I were looking for a front-end engineer and AirBnB doesn't want him, I would definitely hire him.

Also, adding that you are available for work, does NOT help your case.

Just makes the sign on your back even bigger. The sign that reads "I'm THAT guy".

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