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Gaming CS Interviews

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Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#111

Post by Verdex »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #99
manfre wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the candidate says they don't know a topic, that is a valid response. It's not worthwhile to ask detailed questions about the topic. That's a sign of an inexperienced and/or unprepared interviewer.

Asking someone "how many prime numbers are there?" seems pretty valid to me. It's an easy question. The two valid answers are: "a lot" or "infinite" (with "more than 10" also being a fine answer IMO). I'm not sure the interviewer was expecting the actually correct answer here (infinite) - lots of programmers don't know that there are infinite prime numbers - I think he was trying to set up for an explanation of an al…

If the job had been some sort of super low level position requiring a lot of hand written advanced data structures, then I might agree with you. Hashes, priority queues, skip lists, etc all rub up against more math heavy topics (number theory, statistics), so you would expect a candidate to at least have some familiarity with prime numbers.

However, for a web framework? Like, primes are pretty simple, but they're also pretty niche. What range of 'easy' questions that are not directly or indirectly related to the job are allowed to be asked? Can we ask questions about the correct leavening agents to use for different types of bread? I mean technically we're just trying to see how they cover up gaps in their technical knowledge. And all questions are 'easy' for the right people.

If you lure someone into a place with the promise of gainful employment and then waste their time with niche questions that are unrelated but you happen to have warm fuzzies about, then you should probably expect to get a bit of snark.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#112

Post by e63f67dd-065b »

Verdex wrote: post #105
cmeacham98 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're a bit full of yourself here. There are objectively correct ways to search a graph, and it sounds like your solution was nowhere close. You didn't get rejected because you "did not say the word graph", you got rejected because your solution was very wrong. Software engineering is not just about knowing syntax, CS degrees include a Data Structures & Algorithms class for a reason.

> There are objectively correct ways to search a graph Objectively false. Years ago I was talking to some sort of CS professor who had been specializing in networking. He mentioned that within an organization you typically see network's being mapped out with dijkstra, but between them (with BGP for example) you actually see packets routed the long way around. He claimed service providers did this because it allowed t…

The path is still optimal, but the weight of the edges are not speed or distance but a complex utility function that best represents the needs of the business.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#113

Post by supernewton »

thallium205 wrote: post #53
Eleison23 wrote: post #51

The first time I encountered a "riddle" type interview question, I'd already held 5+ jobs and I nominally had 8 years' experience in IT. The job was for a Unix sysadmin job in academia. The interviewer described a room with two lightbulbs in it, and a room down the hall with two switches, and I was supposed to figure out which switch controlled which bulb without going back-and-forth so much. I was stumped & didn't r…

Bulbs nowadays are LED and don't get warm.

LEDs themselves don't really get warm, but LED bulbs that plug into a wall socket have a transformer in their base to step mains voltage down to something the LED can handle, and that can get quite warm.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#114

Post by Verdex »

ZiiS wrote: post #80
leetrout wrote: post #2

> Guidance is expected; a great interview should be more of a conversation than a one-sided question and one-sided answer. I had a particularly awful interview at Google where the interviewer scoffed at me needing assistance. And in an interview at Twitter with a xoogler they asked me what I knew about number theory and I said "nothing" and they said they majored in it and proceeded to ask me number theory questions.…

Whist number theory may never come up in Django tooling. "Something you don't know" always will; it is valid to try and determine how people respond to questions they don't know the answer too.

I think this is an 'okayish' position to take. There are some people who absolutely can't handle being wrong, and I've personally seen them wreck havoc when they get out of their depth.

However, there has to be a limit to the nature of the questions that are being asked. If I'm spending my free time to go check some place out because they're telling me that they might be willing to give me a job, then I'm going to be kind of put out when they start asking me questions about what the 50th letter is in shakespeare's macbeth. The questions have to be somewhat on point. This isn't a medieval system of patronage where I have to be subject to every whim of my patron. We owe each other to not waste each other's time. And if they're going to 'break trump' then I don't see why I shouldn't as well.

I can hear the objection though, 'oh primes are relevant to development.' But are they really? Maybe for advanced data structures like hashes, but what are you doing with a web framework that necessitates you write your own hash function? Besides, if you know about prime numbers, but not weak primes, strong primes, strong pseudo primes, safe primes, etc do you really know about primes and their CS applications? No, you just picked up some random trivia in high school and you're put out that everyone isn't as excited about it as you are.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#115

Post by netrap »

Eleison23 wrote: post #51

The first time I encountered a "riddle" type interview question, I'd already held 5+ jobs and I nominally had 8 years' experience in IT. The job was for a Unix sysadmin job in academia. The interviewer described a room with two lightbulbs in it, and a room down the hall with two switches, and I was supposed to figure out which switch controlled which bulb without going back-and-forth so much. I was stumped & didn't r…

I had this same question on my first IT job interview. Stumped me also... I think now I'd probably do some interview prep next time. I didn't get the job. :-)

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#116

Post by bradlys »

markisus wrote: post #91
bradlys wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This experience varies too much for the individual. I've been given almost no leeway with all of my interviews. Most of my peers are in a similar bucket but I will admit - I seem to get some of the worst experience out of my peer group. I am often given more LC hards than my peers and still rejected even if I give multiple solutions with optimal complexity. At this point, we all suspect it's due to superficial factor…

What is URT?

UnderRepresented Talent.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#117

Post by seer-zig »

leetrout wrote: post #2

> Guidance is expected; a great interview should be more of a conversation than a one-sided question and one-sided answer. I had a particularly awful interview at Google where the interviewer scoffed at me needing assistance. And in an interview at Twitter with a xoogler they asked me what I knew about number theory and I said "nothing" and they said they majored in it and proceeded to ask me number theory questions.…

Do you think they blacklisted you from twitter after that encounter? :P

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#118

Post by bradlys »

jakuboboza wrote: post #68

I've seen people ask questions they can't answer on their own. Always ask self if you really want to work in a place that have this type of people in commanding positions. Also given the saturation of the market with job offers YOU choose not they EMPLOYER. This might change in future but be aware of this current balance, you can game it. Also even if you have infinite skill you might be not liked by random reason. T…

There may a saturation of job offers but the offers aren’t not good. I’m not getting staff offers for $500k+/yr from random enterprise IT consultancy. I’d be lucky if I even got granted stock at many of these companies - let alone a $200k+ salary.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#119

Post by pclmulqdq »

Verdex wrote: post #111
pclmulqdq wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asking someone "how many prime numbers are there?" seems pretty valid to me. It's an easy question. The two valid answers are: "a lot" or "infinite" (with "more than 10" also being a fine answer IMO). I'm not sure the interviewer was expecting the actually correct answer here (infinite) - lots of programmers don't know that there are infinite prime numbers - I think he was trying to set up for an explanation of an al…

If the job had been some sort of super low level position requiring a lot of hand written advanced data structures, then I might agree with you. Hashes, priority queues, skip lists, etc all rub up against more math heavy topics (number theory, statistics), so you would expect a candidate to at least have some familiarity with prime numbers. However, for a web framework? Like, primes are pretty simple, but they're als…

I think if you're going to ask a subsequent question about an algorithm for predicting when bread is done proving, you are allowed to ask about leavening agents. That way, you can bypass the long explanation, and just say "Given n loaves of bread with X characteristics, design an algorithm to predict when they are done proving." That might actually be a decent data science interview question.

I used to ask an algorithms interview question based on bridge (the card game), and I asked a setup question of "have you ever played a trick-taking game?" That lets me see if I need to use the short explanation or the long explanation, and if you answered that you knew how to play bridge or spades in a follow-up question, I would ask a much harder version. If you've never played a card game in your life, I would switch questions (this has happened several times). In real life, most people understand that this kind of question is a setup for a subsequent algorithms problem, not a quiz of your knowledge of bridge or prime numbers (particularly after you say that you don't know number theory).

The interviewer didn't care how much you know about prime numbers any more than I cared about whether you knew how to play hearts/bridge. The interviewer was almost certainly trying to figure out how much he needed to explain in the problem statement for the algorithms problem.

Responding with snark only shows that you are not willing to work with them in good faith, and you are not willing to see where the question is going. It shows that you think you know what they should be asking you, and you have contempt for them because they are not running the interview the way you prefer.

By the way, if the primes thing was actually a quiz question that didn't go anywhere, I would encourage any Django programmer to say a gentle "fuck you" at the end of the interview. I certainly would.

Re: Gaming CS Interviews

#120

Post by _uhtu »

Eleison23 wrote: post #51

The first time I encountered a "riddle" type interview question, I'd already held 5+ jobs and I nominally had 8 years' experience in IT. The job was for a Unix sysadmin job in academia. The interviewer described a room with two lightbulbs in it, and a room down the hall with two switches, and I was supposed to figure out which switch controlled which bulb without going back-and-forth so much. I was stumped & didn't r…

Why is the heat thing even necessary? Turn on one switch, walk down, see which light is on, process of elimination for the other one. Am I missing something?
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