Facebook senior software engineer interview • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#291

Post by janoc » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:32 PM UTC

scottlamb wrote: post #163

janoc wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is not the expectation but that something like that can even come up during an interview for a senior position! It is like testing a surgeon's suturing skill during a job interview. Of course, it is an essential skill for them to have, but that's something for a school exam and not job interview for someone with verifiable credentials. Or do you think that surgeon didn't suture in their previous job and j…

> It is like testing a surgeon's suturing skill during a job interview. Of course, it is an essential skill for them to have, but that's something for a school exam and not job interview for someone with verifiable credentials. Or do you think that surgeon didn't suture in their previous job and just "winged it through" for years? Yes, absolutely, I think that some surgeons can be less skilled at suturing after years…

And you want to say that such assessment is actually done during a job interview and not during, you know, actual surgeries? With a more senior doctor on the team evaluating (and likely mentoring) the new hire?

Seriously?

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#292

Post by hn_throwaway_99 » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:33 PM UTC

llimllib wrote: post #208

georgeglue1 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is off topic, but medical training (at least in the US) is unfortunately about as dysfunctional as you describe. there's are years of inefficient labor from students, residents, fellows, and junior doctors on procedures they'll never do again (because they relatively cheap)

But at least when you're 10 years into your career you aren't judged based on your boards any longer

First of all, I'm not sure where this "10 years" is coming from. I know many/most "senior" developers who reached that level long before 10 years out of university.

Secondly, programming doesn't have a standard licensure process like medicine. If it did, I think a lot of these kinds of interviews that companies do would not be necessary. But as it stands I've interviewed many engineers with years of experience who couldn't competently program, and I'm talking about maybe a tad above FizzBuzz level proficiency.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#293

Post by AnimalMuppet » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:34 PM UTC

Philip-J-Fry wrote: post #191

mrits wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But why?" Because most people can't. And they want to make sure you can.

If you can describe an acceptable algorithm with enough detail in words, you can code it. If some guy had a good employment history, maybe a GitHub with some examples of their skills and described an algorithm to me... Why would I doubt their ability to write it in code?

I can. You can. But apparently, not everyone can.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#294

Post by sj3k » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:38 PM UTC

NeverFade wrote: post #169

sj3k wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interviewed at FB and Amazon last summer and I asked how long people stay once they are hired. At both companies I was told the average tenure is about 1.5 - 2 years. That was a big yiiiiikes moment for me. People don't stick around long enough to get promoted.

> People don't stick around long enough to get promoted. Why do you think that is? Perhaps because the odds of getting promoted are smaller than hopping to a better position in a different company, which is what I argue. If the odds of internal promotion were good enough, why would these employees take the risk and hassle of hopping?

Very good point and definitely something I can personally relate to.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#295

Post by sj3k » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:39 PM UTC

avl999 wrote: post #209

sj3k wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interviewed at FB and Amazon last summer and I asked how long people stay once they are hired. At both companies I was told the average tenure is about 1.5 - 2 years. That was a big yiiiiikes moment for me. People don't stick around long enough to get promoted.

RSUs from your signing bonus vest fully at 2 years (atleast at Amazon). A lot of people bail as soon as that vesting happens.

I don't remember the fully vest time at amazon but at FB it was 4 years.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#296

Post by janoc » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:40 PM UTC

hackinthebochs wrote: post #134

janoc wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is not the expectation but that something like that can even come up during an interview for a senior position! It is like testing a surgeon's suturing skill during a job interview. Of course, it is an essential skill for them to have, but that's something for a school exam and not job interview for someone with verifiable credentials. Or do you think that surgeon didn't suture in their previous job and j…

>that's something for a school exam and not job interview for someone with verifiable credentials The problem is the "verifiable credentials" vary widely in rigor. There is no analogous standardizing and credentialing body like their is in medical fields. So the "basics" need to be tested repeatedly at every new interview. The solution is to have an analogous standardizing body, but people in this field seem to be re…

That's BS. Verifiable credentials mean that you pick up a phone and call the references the candidate gave you.

What you are describing is essentially "it varies widely in rigor - so we must subject every candidate to a full CS exam, because we don't trust anyone."

Even in medical field the schools and standards vary, especially between countries. And there are good and bad doctors. Heck, some have even got their diplomas fraudulently.

However, that doesn't mean you will have the prospective hire sit in for an multiple hours/days of redoing university examinations during an interview - as it seems to be the rule in software engineering (and pretty much nowhere else). You would be laughed out if you tried that.

Especially for a senior position, where the candidate has a past experience you could ask about (i.e. not a freshly out of school student).

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#297

Post by cableshaft » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:41 PM UTC

reidjs wrote: post #78

cableshaft wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if it isn't, do doctors have to retake these exams multiple times (as developers have to do this for multiple interviews) every two years when wanting to switch jobs (doctors often don't have to switch jobs, they often have their own practice).

In somewhat of a parallel, you don’t have to switch jobs either, you can start your own software company at any time ;)

I've tried doing freelance before, and I was a terrible marketer for myself. While that's definitely an option for people in this industry, I'm not sure it's a great path for me.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#298

Post by AnimalMuppet » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:41 PM UTC

whimsicalism wrote: post #234

avl999 wrote: post #228

While I agree that these interviews can be a bit much but what's the alternative? If I am a job seeker I feel much more comfortable knowing that they expect me to write code and answer DS+Alg questions and prepare for it as opposed to companies selecting based on the the prestige level of the University you went or based on subjective judgments based on the resume and/or company fit. As someone who went to a Universi…

People are just salty.

Not at all. You're going to give me a take-home, and you're I've only got a 2% chance of getting hired? Get lost.

That's not "salty". That's refusing to be exploited.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#299

Post by WhompingWindows » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:42 PM UTC

blisterpeanuts wrote: post #65

conorh wrote: post #20

Every time I read these posts I find them very depressing. Crunch through an enormous bunch of algorithm problems in order to perform well on some unrealistic whiteboard programming (I think the system engineering problems are actually more useful though) - as usual we've focused on the easy to measure metric rather than anything actually useful. Maybe these things are meant to be a proxy for how good you are at othe…

After 20 years in software, I had a phone interview with an Amazon guy who sounded half my age (at most). Asked me to write some kind of function to do something, sort some stuff or some such. I described verbally how I would do it, almost line by line, in pseudo-code. He said "I need you to write it out in [some language]". I said "But why? I just told you how I'd do it." But he needed me to literally write the code…

Maybe he had requirements to get actual code samples from applicants. He probably trusted you could do it, but companies have protocols, they probably would want to run analyses on the answers, too.

Re: Facebook senior software engineer interview

#300

Post by cstrahan » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 6:43 PM UTC

Kranar wrote: post #186

cstrahan wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not products in the typical sense, but these are some interesting technologies coming out of Facebook that I can list off the top of my head (many of which I have used personally): * https://engineering.fb.com/2014/06/10/web/open-sourcing-haxl... * https://osquery.io/ * https://rocksdb.org/ * https://fbinfer.com/ * https://flow.org/ * https://prepack.io/

I mean you listed several database libraries, static analyzers, and a code optimizer. Is it your suggestion that those kinds of applications do not require solid knowledge of a variety of different data structures and algorithms?

> I mean you listed several database libraries, static analyzers, and a code optimizer.

Correct.

> Is it your suggestion that those kinds of applications do not require solid knowledge of a variety of different data structures and algorithms?

No -- precisely opposite.

Your response confused me quite a lot, but after some thought, I think I've realized how things have become mixed up. I took this for sarcasm:

> Which innovation of Facebook are you describing? Instagram, WhatsApp, or the stories?

Why did I take that for sarcasm? Because it is apparent to me that Instagram, WhatsApp and stories are not innovative. So I thought the main point of the poster I was replying to was to take a dig at Facebook. I didn't realize that we were in agreement about the importance of data structures and algorithms, but then I also didn't realize that we were still on that topic: my intention was purely to refute the [what I believed to be the implied] notion that nothing innovative was happening at Facebook.