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The case for language agnostic hiring

alphalist.com

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Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#41

Post by thrown_22 »

imgabe wrote: post #21
schroeding wrote: post #8

Elixir, Haskell et al. require concepts that are not required at all in e.g. Java. The functional programming module at my university had the highest failure rate after the math and statistics classes. Even something like C can require new concepts. I was a tutor for a university C programming course and students that had no problems with Java struggled hard with direct memory manipulation, pointer arithmetic etc., b…

A working dev should be well beyond the understanding of a third-year CS student. This is not "advanced" from the perspective of someone in practice, it is the requirement to get in to the practice. (I know people get programming jobs without CS degrees, but if you can do that, you can teach yourself how pointers work)

In mathematics first year students who have started specializing already have knowledge that PhDs in other mathematical specializations don't. CS is exactly the same.

You can't teach Joy to someone who has only programmed in JS any more than you can do the reverse. The difference is that we have a lot of people who have learned only algol derivatives and don't understand just how _weird_ the zoo of non-standard languages is.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#42

Post by schroeding »

AlchemistCamp wrote: post #23
schroeding wrote: post #8

Elixir, Haskell et al. require concepts that are not required at all in e.g. Java. The functional programming module at my university had the highest failure rate after the math and statistics classes. Even something like C can require new concepts. I was a tutor for a university C programming course and students that had no problems with Java struggled hard with direct memory manipulation, pointer arithmetic etc., b…

This is a bit overblown, IMO. I'm currently in the process of interviewing and hiring for a dev to work on an Elixir code base and I barely care at all whether or not a candidate has ever used it before. Last year I worked with an (excellent) ex-Bridgewater dev whose experience was mostly JVM and JS and he ramped up on Elixir and Phoenix very quickly. We pair programmed a couple of hours a day and he was productive i…

> some slack during paid hours for people to learn and improve

A key ingredient missing in the blog post, IMO. :)

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#43

Post by AlchemistCamp »

nerdponx wrote: post #26
AlchemistCamp wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bit overblown, IMO. I'm currently in the process of interviewing and hiring for a dev to work on an Elixir code base and I barely care at all whether or not a candidate has ever used it before. Last year I worked with an (excellent) ex-Bridgewater dev whose experience was mostly JVM and JS and he ramped up on Elixir and Phoenix very quickly. We pair programmed a couple of hours a day and he was productive i…

What would have happened if your team didn't already have a bunch of experienced Elixir users on it? You'd have the blind leading the blind.

For the project last year, it wasn't a bunch. It was just me and the ex-Bridgewater guy who was learning.

Also, I taught myself back in 2017 while working on my own startup. Even back then, the docs were good and there were lots of helpful people on the internet.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#44

Post by _tardigrade »

imgabe wrote: post #21
schroeding wrote: post #8

Elixir, Haskell et al. require concepts that are not required at all in e.g. Java. The functional programming module at my university had the highest failure rate after the math and statistics classes. Even something like C can require new concepts. I was a tutor for a university C programming course and students that had no problems with Java struggled hard with direct memory manipulation, pointer arithmetic etc., b…

A working dev should be well beyond the understanding of a third-year CS student. This is not "advanced" from the perspective of someone in practice, it is the requirement to get in to the practice. (I know people get programming jobs without CS degrees, but if you can do that, you can teach yourself how pointers work)

I don't have CS degree but I do have 7 years commercial experience with Python/Django Rest Framework and I have no idea how pointers work.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#45

Post by eru »

nerdponx wrote: post #26
AlchemistCamp wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bit overblown, IMO. I'm currently in the process of interviewing and hiring for a dev to work on an Elixir code base and I barely care at all whether or not a candidate has ever used it before. Last year I worked with an (excellent) ex-Bridgewater dev whose experience was mostly JVM and JS and he ramped up on Elixir and Phoenix very quickly. We pair programmed a couple of hours a day and he was productive i…

What would have happened if your team didn't already have a bunch of experienced Elixir users on it? You'd have the blind leading the blind.

In that case they should have probably not picked Elixir?

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#46

Post by nonasktell »

tester756 wrote: post #24
nonasktell wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you only know java are you even a real (professional) dev? I'd expect any dev wanting a job using a language he doesn't know to have some understanding all of the concepts you're talking about. It's not language specific, it's just the basics of programming.

>If you only know java are you even a real (professional) dev? lol, if I were java dev I'd be pissed off. honestly this unsound argument that dev which knows more languages is better just because of that needs to die. Concepts are above languages You don't have to know languages in order to be familiar with the concepts. Additionally certain languages do not offer real value to the other For example I've been writing…

"You don't have to know languages in order to be familiar with the concepts."

If you only ever coded in a language that doesn't even offer you the ability to tinker with some concepts, you can't be familiar with those. Reading one article about it without ever touching code, is not being familiar with a programming concept.

I'm not saying you should know 10 languages, but if you want to be anything more than a frontend dev or a bad web dev, you need to be exposed to more than 1 language IMHO. I'm not saying you should be an expert, or used multiples languages for years, but at least trying other languages with concepts not available in your favorite language.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#47

Post by nonasktell »

mtrycz2 wrote: post #39
nonasktell wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you only know java are you even a real (professional) dev? I'd expect any dev wanting a job using a language he doesn't know to have some understanding all of the concepts you're talking about. It's not language specific, it's just the basics of programming.

Believe it or not, people have professional dev carriers knowing only gasp JavaScript.

And that's how you get desktop chat apps that needs 8 GB of ram and 50% of your cpu to stay idle.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#49

Post by yakshaving_jgt »

mguerville wrote: post #17
dontlaugh wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps if workers were treated and paid better, they'd have less incentive to leave every two years.

My former CEO invested significantly in training (I personally received well over $250k worth, including leadership lessons from 2 weeks reliving D Day with military men, rowing with National champion coaches at Yale, etc.) and used to say people challenged him with « what of you spend all this money to train them and they leave? », to which he replied « what if we don’t train and develop them and they stay, isn’t th…

Have you tried Googling that phrase? Seems like lots of people are your former CEO.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#50

Post by imgabe »

_tardigrade wrote: post #44
imgabe wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A working dev should be well beyond the understanding of a third-year CS student. This is not "advanced" from the perspective of someone in practice, it is the requirement to get in to the practice. (I know people get programming jobs without CS degrees, but if you can do that, you can teach yourself how pointers work)

I don't have CS degree but I do have 7 years commercial experience with Python/Django Rest Framework and I have no idea how pointers work.

Right, there’s no reason you’d need to know in Python.

How quickly could you pick it up if you had to?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointer_(computer_programmin...

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