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The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

zipcpu.com

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Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#61

Post by Danieru »

brandmeyer wrote: post #29
gopalv wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a software engineer who considers writing any tests beneath them, a job for someone else I'd also balk at that for an interview take-home test. I was an Indian QE guy looking for a dev job once. I was that guy whose job was to write tests for someone else, which wasn't fun at all. If I had interviewed somewhere and I felt the conversation was going towards "how good are you at writing tests, write some", I'd have n…

I can see why your experience might lead you to that particular bias. However, that's not where he's coming from. If you've followed his blog over the years, you'll see that he believes you cannot be a decent hardware engineer unless you also have some formal verification chops and use formal methods as part of your design methodology. That's his bias. He expects a practicing HDL engineer to write their own verificat…

To expand on your point: the client asked him to evaluate. That he expects good HDL engineers to handle verification is thus also part of the client's requirements.

The client trusts him, not a theoretical average engineer but the exact specific engineer who has been successfully delivering results. The client wants another one of those HDL engineers who handles verification. The candidates rejection is indeed an impasse, such happens. Doesn't mean the candidate was wise.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#62

Post by unishark »

ampdepolymerase wrote: post #11
smnrchrds wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the disconnect was not about compensation, but expectations. If you are working for a small business, you have to wear many hats. There are not enough X jobs to fill all your time, so you do X 60% of the time and Y, Z, and Q the other 40%. In a BigCo, there is enough work to go around that 200 people can work full-time just on X. If you get hired for X, you don't have to do anything but X. The client, if they…

All these problems will solve themselves if the companies raise their compensation. You see this in the ML industry all the time. Many non-tech companies and even small to medium sized tech companies expect their data scientists to be fullstack engineers. And yet refuse to offer a similar level of compensation. Then they wonder why all the top talent flock to unicorn and FAANG type corporations.

I do agree no one should be whining about being unable to find sufficiently-skilled people to hire when the only real problem is they don't offer enough to get them. But I'm not sure it's fair to hold all businesses to the pay standard of massive tech giants who can monopolize one new product niche after another by leveraging their current dominant positions along with the patent/legal systems. Not to mention their exuberance-driven stock to throw around. Such a business model simply can't be available to all.

However I suspect we aren't talking about FAANG/unicorn-capable top talent here, hence the candidate applied to this job in the first place. I'd also be suspicious the candidate is ducking questions because they can't answer them. Unless it's just interview practice for them and a waste of time for the company anyway.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#63

Post by SV_BubbleTime »

wyldfire wrote: post #33
jasonhansel wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From another post: https://zipcpu.com/blog/2018/10/04/welcome.html > My Christian beliefs are centered around a literal interpretation of the Bible. This includes a belief in a 6-day creation that took place roughly six-thousand years ago, a belief that God will cause the end of this world rather than any man-induced climate change, a firm belief that a free people should be an armed people, and more. Ouch.

I would worry that a young Earth creationist might make a poor designer. Someone who might ignore the evidence of a design error in favor of some other interpretation not supported by evidence. Why did the deity put the fossils there? In order to confuse us? In order to challenge the faithful? It defies reason. You can only put it as a mystery of faith. But it needn't be.

> Why did the deity put the fossils there? In order to confuse us? In order to challenge the faithful?

Went into a creationist museum once (real thing). And the literal answer to your question was ”Yes, Satan put the fossils there to temp us away”.

I can’t attribute that to all creationist, but it was the case for the few I interacted with.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#64

Post by Danieru »

FormhellFrom wrote: post #22
jcims wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>On top of that, my client was offering to pay this individual to do the work.

Yes, but /how much/ was the client offering to pay? This whole situation screams of someone trying to get a cheap deal, then getting mad when the attempted victim wises up. (This is pretty typical with loud-and-proud small business types, IME)

How can one get a "deal" on "throw away interview tasks"? The requested tasks only existed to prove the candidates skill. Paying for the time was above all a method to justify the time usage and show seriousness on the client's part.

The only value created by the interview is the possible hiring of the candidate themselves. There is no room for profitability interviewing candidates "on the cheap".

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#65

Post by geofft »

SalamandersRUs wrote: post #14

If you found this article interesting, I'd recommend this article by the same author: https://zipcpu.com/blog/2020/11/26/zipcpu-biz.html > On another team I worked with, I was asked to call a man by female pronouns. This one brings me more grief, as I enjoyed working with the individual in question. He wanted to declare himself to be a woman. He changed his name, his clothing, his looks, his dress, you name it. While…

I was wondering why this guy was a one-person company when, apparently, his time is overcommitted and it's a buyer's market for FPGA engineers according to him.

Now I understand.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#66

Post by redis_mlc »

vmception wrote: post #41
redis_mlc wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the consensus in the US is that sex and gender are separate concepts. Stop lying. That is not the consensus in the US, aside from woke SJWs like yourself.

Within inclusionary communities it is a prevailing consensus. It makes it make sense and is very benign for everyone else to accomodate.

[dead]

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#67

Post by geofft »

ip26 wrote: post #13
FormhellFrom wrote: post #12

I really don’t see what’s wrong with an applicant saying “no”. Employers say “no” all the time! The paragraphs and paragraphs about small-business ownership and how you have to hustle and grind and have character seemed really odd to me. Your applicant didn’t want to do what you wanted them to do. Just move on?

I think the author was just a bit peeved after interviewing what he saw as the hardware equivalent of a software engineer who considers writing any tests beneath them, a job for someone else.

But "verification engineer" is a separate specialty - much like "QA engineer" is a separate specialty. I didn't get the sense that the candidate considered anything beneath them, just that the candidate was looking for a specific job.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#68

Post by SV_BubbleTime »

01100011 wrote: post #46
typon wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the Bible really talk about "free people being armed"?

No. It says Christians should obey the authorities, pay taxes, turn the other cheek, not equate gain with godliness, and it plainly states "Pure and undefiled religion" is to take care of the unfortunate(Widows in this case) and keep oneself unspotted from the World. It doesn't say to build a Christian nation. It doesn't say to fight abortion. It doesn't say to kill your neighbor if he wants to take your stuff. I am…

Then Jesus said, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.

It seems silly to take those words and interpret them in a way that means you should not defend yourself.

The real answer is that the Bible was written by people who like it or not had agendas themselves. What was King Jame’s word, and why was it so important he had his own version of the Bible?

Christianity like most other religions has plenty of examples of righteous self-defense.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#69

Post by unishark »

Ostrogodsky wrote: post #47
W-Stool wrote: post #36

I guess I'll be the first to say it - does the author of the article strike anyone as a bit of a pretentious asshole? Downvote away if you have to, but I just thought someone needed to say that.

He has a lot of red-flags: - Bringing over and over again that "he was an official of the US army" - the "you didnt reject me, I reject you" spiel, although this part was hilarious to be fair,for being so childish. - The part when "he bit his tongue" before answering to the kid. What does he think he had to answer? - The "one person Christian company" thing And I got bored, he sounds like a "Prima-Donna" too. The pos…

It was the air force. And anyone who can graduate from an engineering program (and lacks a drug-use history or whatever probably) can probably qualify for that. They recruit pretty aggressively at universities.

He did make an unnecessarily-specific statement about being a lt. colonel at one point, but I don't know that it's a hard rank to get to. I though it was more the point at which career officers got stuck.

Re: The FPGA Designer Who Didn't Get the Job

#70

Post by spear »

wyldfire wrote: post #33
jasonhansel wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From another post: https://zipcpu.com/blog/2018/10/04/welcome.html > My Christian beliefs are centered around a literal interpretation of the Bible. This includes a belief in a 6-day creation that took place roughly six-thousand years ago, a belief that God will cause the end of this world rather than any man-induced climate change, a firm belief that a free people should be an armed people, and more. Ouch.

I would worry that a young Earth creationist might make a poor designer. Someone who might ignore the evidence of a design error in favor of some other interpretation not supported by evidence. Why did the deity put the fossils there? In order to confuse us? In order to challenge the faithful? It defies reason. You can only put it as a mystery of faith. But it needn't be.

In my first HW design job out of college, I was very surprised when a senior engineer made that exact claim -- that God planted dinosaur fossils in the ground. I knew he was very religious and I could tell he was quite serious, but it was long ago and I had never heard of Young Earth Creationism, so I was shocked into silence. (Also, he was my manager and I decided I couldn't afford to argue.)
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