The software development final exam: Algorithms and Data Structures

I see that you're the author. Thanks for replying!

> Sure, there's plenty of software development which doesn't involve fancy algorithms or data structures... avoiding computer architecture, operating systems, mathematics, networking, databases, and distributed systems as well is a bit harder.

This is at odds with the statement in your article that jumped out at me:

"If you can't answer the majority of the questions on these four papers, and you're working or intend to work as a software developer, you should ask yourself why--"

I disagree, and furthermore, adding more topics means that your assertion is going to be less accurate.

Of course, it's better to know more, and I'm glad to have a computer science degree. However, I think that conflating having a computer science background and general software development is confirmation bias. I don't have data to back me up, but I believe that it's more common to simply not need to know what a bipartite graph is, or even a majority set of these topics. Given the theoretical grounding of the question in your first block, I'm guessing that parts 2-4 will be similarly structured.

Computer science is one slice of software development. Software development is a huge, deep field. A software development exam could just as easily contain an exam including the following topics: communicating effectively through email, distilling requirements from customers, writing meaningful commit messages, testing theory, or hundreds of other non-theoretical topics.

What I'm trying to say is that your exam is a good reminder of computer science at the root of many of the fields of knowledge in software, and is fun, but it's not representative of software development. In a given year, most software developers are going to spend more time puzzling through garden-variety implementation bugs than thinking about any two of the questions you list. Which is why they're not "lucky". :)

How do you "figure out" what a B-tree is? That's a trivia question.

How do I access this course?

The website says: "Enrollment is Closed"

I have a CS degree and I am employed as an Application Developer.

To me these questions are daunting. Am I the only one here who feels like they have an inferior CS degree? Reading the comments in HN threads usually makes me feel a bit dumb, but this post in particular makes me feel like a lot of money has been thrown at a degree that did not teach me a lot about Computer Science.

I remember reading a thread someplace (I think here or at reddit) that criticized the traditional software developer interview process. One person made the suggestion that the reason why a lot of companies ask more...bookish knowledge that seems like its from college homework/final exam, is that they don't want to admit that what they do is relatively mundane, and doesn't really require the daily application of the kind of thing you find on your data structures or operating systems final exam. So, they add complexity to their interview questions, as well as their development process, to compensate.

Does anyone know if traditional, "real" engineering fields, (civil, chemical, mechanical, etc) ask detailed, technical kinds of questions during interviews, like software engineering is known for? I find it hard to believe civil engineers get bombarded with all day grill fests by other civil engineers about technical questions in interviews, but I really don't know.