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When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

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Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#431

Post by Jensson »

jseban wrote: post #309
actually_a_dog wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing about github hat prevents you from working that way. I don't see what your issue is. But, I will say that I don't want people who can't separate criticism of their code from criticism of themselves on my team. You can certainly have whatever feelings you want, as long as it doesn't get in the way of producing the best possible product, all things considered.

Yeah there's nothing that prevents you from using a tool in exactly the opposite way that it's designed to be used, but it's also pretty unlikely that it's going to happen or that it's going to be successful.

Just make a PR early and discuss the code as you build and make changes, not sure in what way the tool wasn't made to do that. Then you also get the discussion interleaved with changes, resulting in basically perfect documentation of how the code was made and why.

The only thing PR's lack in that regard is that if the reviewer accepts it then it gets added automatically, while ideally you should re review things after the reviewer has accepted it. That way they wont accidentally accept prototype changes.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#432

Post by irrational »

wingerlang wrote: post #279
irrational wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are they sharing their code? At my company things are locked down so tightly that I can’t move code off of company computers. I would have to look at the code on one computer and type it into a computer of my own. Unless people are doing interviews on their company computer or the company is careless with their code, I’m not sure how someone would even share their work code.

Not sure how locked your computer is but everywhere I've ever worked, it's been trivial. Email the source file, zip it and upload somewhere, pastebin temporary, airdrop it, usb sticks.

All of those things you mentioned? Blocked. As an example, if I even plug any sort of device like a usb stick or an external drive to my machine, the computer locks up and security is on the phone with my manager within seconds.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#433

Post by [deleted] »

BFLpL0QNek wrote: post #41

I like this approach. Far to often I’ve interviewed at places and been grilled by the interviewer only to find out when you start the quality isn’t great, what you where grilled on you won’t be working on “as that’s to hard” or “we don’t do that” despite being grilled on it and the level of skill not to great they just want senior people. It’s the bait and switch. At least being taken through existing code you know w…

[deleted]

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#434

Post by auspex »

zdragnar wrote: post #119
BFLpL0QNek wrote: post #41

I like this approach. Far to often I’ve interviewed at places and been grilled by the interviewer only to find out when you start the quality isn’t great, what you where grilled on you won’t be working on “as that’s to hard” or “we don’t do that” despite being grilled on it and the level of skill not to great they just want senior people. It’s the bait and switch. At least being taken through existing code you know w…

> Bonus points for no PR’s and trunk driven development as that shows a very mature team. Ugh, pass. Trunk development is fine. Skipping PRs just brings back nightmares of SVN. Even if 90% of PRs are approved without comment, it's extremely helpful for everyone to have a second set of eyes on work before it is merged in.

Workflow and pull request approvals are required for SOC 2 type1/2 compliance.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#435

Post by hiptobecubic »

jseban wrote: post #296
doctor_eval wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn’t have to be like this. Even when I was CTO, I’d submit my code in a PR and my team would pull me up on mistakes and inconsistencies. It was really annoying! And also great. PRs are a great way for the whole team to learn about how the organisation cuts code, and can reduce the number of errors, but of course with poor leadership they can be used for evil.

> It doesn’t have to be like this. Even when I was CTO, I’d submit my code in a PR and my team would pull me up on mistakes and inconsistencies. It was really annoying! And also great. I can imagine that you had fun mingling with the commoners for a day, now try it on all of your actual work, and with the whole C-level team gang up on you for each review. > about how the organisation cuts code You don't have any guid…

I agree with the others commenting here and can't relate to your experience at all. Review is a huge positive and while it does "slow things down" it usually is preventing people from slamming into walls at high speed, so that's a positive too.

Maybe your work experience is mostly in a high stress, prototype-heavy environment where it's more important to launch something than it is to have a maintainable, incrementally improving codebase? I worked at a consultancy like that and it was very different from "big product" long term work.

As for the social dynamics, it sounds like your workplace culture just blows.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#436

Post by wnolens »

mylons wrote: post #90
BFLpL0QNek wrote: post #41

I like this approach. Far to often I’ve interviewed at places and been grilled by the interviewer only to find out when you start the quality isn’t great, what you where grilled on you won’t be working on “as that’s to hard” or “we don’t do that” despite being grilled on it and the level of skill not to great they just want senior people. It’s the bait and switch. At least being taken through existing code you know w…

the blog author doesn’t take them through the company’s code base. the author creates code for the interview.

Yea a lot of people in this thread missed that point. It's still contrived problems, just testing comprehension rather than creation. But you can contrive much larger problems than you could ever ask a candidate to code, so you escape the ability for a candidate to practice your exact questions to some degree.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#437

Post by Aperocky »

amai wrote: post #409

In my company we go one step further: We encourage the candidates to „bring their own code“. Then we let them explain their code, discuss possible issues, extensions and so on. Usually simply from looking at the code style one can infer a lot about the candidates level of skills. Also the candidates are less nervous and are sometimes really enthusiastic explaining their favorite side project. All in all it leads to a…

I have a lot of weekend-ish side project on github (e.g. http://aperocky.com/cellular-automata/), but I also know a lot of capable engineers that does not have that. One of my favorite thing to look at for a candidate are their github, but unfortunately more often than not people don't have it or only CS-X01 repository exists. The interview is in no way affected by this as it is not an indication of weak technical ability.

But if someone does have it, it does get looked at, at least through me.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#438

Post by pkdpic »

Why don't companies just have prospective candidates work for 2-4 weeks on the actual job unpaid and then select 1-2 candidates from that pool based on performance?

Most job seekers are working for free when applying for jobs anyway and it seems like this would have the nice benefit of providing a free rotating labor force for the hiring companies. It might even allow them to do without a couple of paid positions long-term.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#439

Post by boffinism »

pkdpic wrote: post #438

Why don't companies just have prospective candidates work for 2-4 weeks on the actual job unpaid and then select 1-2 candidates from that pool based on performance? Most job seekers are working for free when applying for jobs anyway and it seems like this would have the nice benefit of providing a free rotating labor force for the hiring companies. It might even allow them to do without a couple of paid positions lon…

No post body was provided.

Re: When hiring developers, have the candidate read existing code

#440

Post by kyawzazaw »

pkdpic wrote: post #438

Why don't companies just have prospective candidates work for 2-4 weeks on the actual job unpaid and then select 1-2 candidates from that pool based on performance? Most job seekers are working for free when applying for jobs anyway and it seems like this would have the nice benefit of providing a free rotating labor force for the hiring companies. It might even allow them to do without a couple of paid positions lon…

Experienced people don’t have time for that.
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