That actually seems like a good idea. Interesting, practical and you can see if they are socially inept. I’d actually try this.
Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
101–110 of 181 posts
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
You really need two in physically different locations (ideally ASes) with some form of failover, assuming you want a reasonable guaranteed uptime
Does 99.995% [1] of hackernews sound reasonable enough to you? The reality is a lot of systems (especially simple ones) run perfectly fine on a single server with next to no downtime and all the additional redundancies we introduce also add additional points of failures and without the scale that makes these necessary you might actually end up reducing your availability. [1] https://hn.hund.io/
HN is on a pair of servers.
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
The people who are fooled by fast talkers don’t care about the results of leetcode questions either.
Even just giving Leetcode questions isn’t enough anymore… I’ve had plenty of people just memorize the top 50 used questions and be able to answer them, but then not be able to explain anything about their answer. It’s exhausting.
It's super easy to filter for that though. Just change the problem slightly. If they give the rote answer you know what you need to know. It does require that you know the answer though. :)
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#104I think the "fake product" interview is a great format, but it can be done poorly if the setup is unrealistic. I've been on the receiving end of a couple of very bad attempts. In one, which I have described here before, an interviewer asked me to design a system for selling concert tickets. After half an hour of confused back and forth, it emerged that they wanted a network service that replied to requests with unpre…
To be fair, I would say if your task is to design a system it's your job to find out what the person actually wants and not run with assumptions you made based on a bad description. The reality is that you will usually start with a bad description. So I'm not sure if these misunderstandings actually reflect that badly on the interviewer/the question.
I think if they were testing my ability to work through misunderstandings in requirements, they would have been decently impressed that I got from "system for selling concert tickets" to "system for giving out random integers" in half an hour. But they weren't impressed, they were irritated.
Edit: Also I don't think a normal product requirements discovery process involves figuring out that you're actually being asked to solve a different problem in a vastly different domain. You shouldn't ask someone to build Netflix while thinking "let's see how long it takes them to realize I meant Twitter."
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does 99.995% [1] of hackernews sound reasonable enough to you? The reality is a lot of systems (especially simple ones) run perfectly fine on a single server with next to no downtime and all the additional redundancies we introduce also add additional points of failures and without the scale that makes these necessary you might actually end up reducing your availability. [1] https://hn.hund.io/
HN is on a pair of servers.
The second one is just a standby though and not in another region. And if I recall correctly dang mentioned at an outage that the failover to the standby is manual. But I'm not sure.
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
Could you just have them sign an NDA and pair with people on some non-trade-secret real issue that needs addressing? If you start by giving a little bit of context and then jump into some reasonable end of the backlog, then you get to see how they think of priorities, they get to ask you lots of contextual questions, you get negotiate with each other a thing to do, you get to investigate and/or develop a solution, an…
My favorite interview experience was a short take-home that required me to write a toy version of something the company actually did on a day-to-day basis, followed by an in-person pairing session to extend that toy to handle more functionality and cover certain edge cases. Of course, the downside is that it required me to spend four hours working on this at home, and then another several hours at the interview - but…
What hourly rate did you charge?
I have bills, and free labor doesn't pay them. If an employer spends 1-2 hours talking tech, the role, experience, culture fit, and maybe a quick "yes, I can code" toy PoC -- fine, I'll volunteer. But if one interview process requires a day+ of investment...I'll pass, thanks. Ditto for whiteboard hazing rituals, whose prerequisites include memorizing algo' arcana and cute puzzles. I have personal obligations, which I won't sacrifice to practice dancing like a clown for a stranger with a fetish for reinventing bubble sort or whatever.
Either respect my time and status as your peer, or don't bother wasting both of our time. If that means fewer opportunities for me, then so be it. My deathbed reflections won't include "Damn, I regret spending so much time with loved ones instead of learning how to optimally stack rings onto three pegs."
Apologies for the rant. I'm clearly passionate about this lol
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
Great! Isn’t that the point? That some people who really don’t want the job won’t invest a bit of their time and people who do really want the job will?
That selects for people who aren’t holding productive jobs currently. It’s a reasonable filter for junior positions, but seems counterproductive if you’re looking to fill a position where experience would be valuable.
No, it selects for people who want the job.
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
Great! Isn’t that the point? That some people who really don’t want the job won’t invest a bit of their time and people who do really want the job will?
I doubt it? My willingness to practice leetcode isn't correlated with my interest in new work or the work any given job post describes. It's also not correlated with my willingness to invest time in exploring the position. 6 hours of leetcode practice teach me nothing about a position, the work it entails, the problems the company is grappling with, and the people I'd be in the trenches with. 6 hours in conversation…
> My willingness to practice leetcode isn't correlated with my interest in new work or the work any given job post describes.
The job requires you to practice leetcode in order to get the job. If you don’t want to practice leetcode then you don’t want the job.
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
So overly specific that it feels inappropriately artificial within the context of testing a stranger.
Yeah, the kind of question that I'm not comfortable giving a vague nonanswer to because I'm not familiar with all the intricacies they spent months ironing out. Which then turns into "what do you want me to say" whackamole of endless questions to gain the context needed to actually answer their question. Usually asked by people who cannot provide the context that actually led to the answer but still believe they unde…
If the question is sufficiently related to the actual application, it could be an interview of the "solve our biggest problems for us, unpaid, without context" form, which I experienced once at a tiny startup. The technical lead just sat there silently as I probed with more questions. Eventually, I set down a boundary and let them know that that is something for the business to solve.
Re: Becoming a dungeon master for an interview
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
Great! Isn’t that the point? That some people who really don’t want the job won’t invest a bit of their time and people who do really want the job will?
Don't forget about the people who don't have to spend weeks or months focused just on interview prep to do well on the average leetcode question... That's who interviewers are looking for. Now, a case can be made that there aren't that many of those people and you might not need them anyway, but... if you can spend a few weeks to catch up that's not all bad compared to what high-end job offers in other professions de…
These jobs pay a lot of money. If you want one bad enough you’ll find the time to practice.