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Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

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Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#111

Post by teeray »

donatj wrote: post #37
collyw wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick chat with HR followed by a "coding challenge" for free. I just had a recruitment consultant tell me that my perspective might be wrong for not wanting to do it. He had 70 people in his pipeline for 25 jobs. So I do half a days worth of work for free and I have approx 2 - 1 chance that I don't get the job.

It’s been ten years and I am still mad at Facebook. Post phone interview on Friday I was given a code challenge to complete over the weekend. When I submitted it on Monday I received a response immediately “The team has reviewed your resume and decided to not move forward. We will not be reviewing your code challenge. Feel free to apply again in one year.” I spent my whole weekend on it, it was shined and buffed and…

> I spent my whole weekend on it, it was shined and buffed and you could have at least glanced at it. Or at the very least lied to me.

This is why coding challenges are an immediate dealbreaker for me these days. If I’m going to do a project to showcase my skills, you can be sure I’m going to put my all into it. Getting ghosted after that is insulting beyond words.

Put me in an interview setting and I at least know that it’s time-boxed and the interviewer is losing just as much time as I am.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#112

Post by jriot »

collyw wrote: post #14
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #2

1) Execs complaining that it's hard to find skilled workers nowadays, while doing their best to make the company an unattractive workplace and not bother retaining existing workers who are leaving (including me soon). Guys, it's not rocket science, just ask your employees what's bothering them. If people are leaving by the numbers, then you have some serious issues that need to be fixed, otherwise the churn will neve…

A quick chat with HR followed by a "coding challenge" for free. I just had a recruitment consultant tell me that my perspective might be wrong for not wanting to do it. He had 70 people in his pipeline for 25 jobs. So I do half a days worth of work for free and I have approx 2 - 1 chance that I don't get the job.

FanDuel sent me test (data science) before I talked with anyone. I'll admit the questions appeared aligned with the work and would be interesting. But I am not taking a test before talking with anyone.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#113

Post by [deleted] »

_8j50 wrote: post #65
neonsunset wrote: post #51

Reality check I got after being accused of having anti-minority opinion while arguing for protection of all categories of people, just without double standards and without giving priority to some over others. This got me instantly banned from a community I had professional interest and participation in, which made me realize the damaging effects of culture wars that are about to get worse for major corporations. With…

How is this even relevant to tech work? Minority, inclusion,etc... do you work in HR, legal or PR? If not how does writing code or engineering systems include that subject? Honestly curious.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#114

Post by nequo »

I am late to this game so I assume everyone else’s brain was melted by this in 2017:

Every Intel CPU since 2008 includes an autonomous computer called the Intel Management Engine that runs Minix, completely circumvents your own OS, has full access to memory, has network access, and cannot be turned off by the owner of the hardware (you).

We also don’t know what it does because it’s extremely difficult to reverse engineer due to obfuscation and because Minix 3 is published under a BSD license so Intel is not obligated to publish the source code.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#115

Post by krm01 »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #56
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coding and tech hiring challenges are far longer than half a day nowadays. Some are even up to two weeks. I much prefer an hour of whiteboarding grilling than wasting an entire week on open ended problems full of fluff.

Person I'm replying to said half a day, hence my reply that this is actually pretty good! That being said, I've never had coding tests for more than a few hours.

More than a few hours seems pretty extreme.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#116

Post by honkdaddy »

pasabagi wrote: post #68
neonsunset wrote: post #51

Reality check I got after being accused of having anti-minority opinion while arguing for protection of all categories of people, just without double standards and without giving priority to some over others. This got me instantly banned from a community I had professional interest and participation in, which made me realize the damaging effects of culture wars that are about to get worse for major corporations. With…

I think there are two points: first, 'all lives matter' is a typical dog whistle for a lot of people who are racist , even if you are not. If you're going to argue that line, you have to try and put some clear water between you and them. The second point is that, in an unjust society, not accounting for the effects of that injustice on people (say candidates for a job position) compounds that injustice. So like, if y…

I feel like this is a classic case of American exceptionalisms. Americans have an absolutely bonkers relationship with race and often assume that other Westerners around the world feel the same way.

The _only_ reason the phrase "All Lives Matter" has any remotely political juice to it is because of the riots that occurred in America two years ago; the phrase itself is entirely innocuous and is really something most reasonable people can get behind.

It bothers me to no end when people imply that the rest of the English speaking world should try to update their lexicon and tread carefully around certain words simply to appease a tiny minority of Americans.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#117

Post by giantg2 »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #2

1) Execs complaining that it's hard to find skilled workers nowadays, while doing their best to make the company an unattractive workplace and not bother retaining existing workers who are leaving (including me soon). Guys, it's not rocket science, just ask your employees what's bothering them. If people are leaving by the numbers, then you have some serious issues that need to be fixed, otherwise the churn will neve…

Might as well mic drop and turn of the commenting on this post, cause this says it.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#118

Post by giantg2 »

throwawaylala1 wrote: post #40
collyw wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick chat with HR followed by a "coding challenge" for free. I just had a recruitment consultant tell me that my perspective might be wrong for not wanting to do it. He had 70 people in his pipeline for 25 jobs. So I do half a days worth of work for free and I have approx 2 - 1 chance that I don't get the job.

Do your thing I guess. The results will speak for themselves. Just know that even in the mid-2000s (when the market was red hot) there were all sorts of hurdles you'd have to go through to get a good gig. A lot of that involved doing work "for free". A little hustle pays dividends long term. It's much worse in other industries.

"A little hustle pays dividends long term."

Only if you're lucky too. Hustle by itself means nothing.

Re: Ask HN: What has melted your brain recently?

#119

Post by mark_l_watson »

rsyring wrote: post #13

Age. I turned 40 and realized I probably wasn't on the upswing of life anymore. I've developed a small but weighty sense of "time is running out" that I didn't have before. I want that to be a motivator to do good and meaningful things and not a growing sense of foreboding. That necessitates contemplation of life, faith, priorities, etc.

Well my friend, you are describing what Stoic Philosophers call “momento mori.” Always remember death is coming and enjoy every moment as it passes.

You just turned 40, I just turned 71. I celebrated by taking a challenging part time job for a company that I feel confident that I can help.

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