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Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

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Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#501

Post by Izkata »

meko wrote: post #381
Balgair wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if HackerRank has updated itself recently, but the last time I poked my head in there (years ago), all the answers were in the "Talk about this challenge" section. You'd just go in there and copy paste the code in, maybe change the variable names/order a bit. Ever since I learned that, it's never been that 'wowzers' for me.

Isn't the whole point of the challenge to figure out how to do the problem? What you say is literally just copy/pasting others' answers. Is that not looked down on?

Given the name of the site (I've never used it), I always assumed it was about proving your ability to others (like maybe future employers). Easily-found answers totally destroys the trust that's needed for such a thing to work.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#502

Post by Izkata »

bradleyjg wrote: post #491
Izkata wrote: post #476

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right at the top of that link: > Testing or measuring procedures cannot be determinative in employment decisions unless they have some connection to the job. IQ tests are not directly related to the job, and so are illegal according to that ruling. Coding tests are directly related, which is why they get a pass.

You didn’t read the opinion and you added the word “directly” to the summary. Do you scan source code and draw firm conclusions about what it does based on skim reading the first comment you see? Perhaps my old contracts prof could have a second career as a google interviewer. (He was notorious for cold calling people that hadn’t briefed their cases and eating them alive.)

The purpose of the "Primary Holding" section is to summarize the result, so that you don't have to dig through the whole thing.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#503

Post by akhilcacharya »

pps43 wrote: post #20
akhilcacharya wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy - reverse a string, determine if a string is a palindrome, reverse the digits of an integer, determine if one string is an anagram of another. Hard - implement a subset of regex match in optimal time+space, find the operations required to turn 1 word into another word given a list of transitory words, find the median of 2 sorted arrays in optimal time, find the next permuted value.

That's more like small/large than easy/hard.

I'd argue finding the next permutation is actually very difficult if you don't know the standard algorithm.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#504

Post by bitwize »

zanny wrote: post #361
TeMPOraL wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally true. In my case it was a natural progression: "videogames are great!" -> "I have an idea for even better videogame!" -> "how do I make one?" -> "can I tweak this one into being a bit more the way I like it?" -> tinkering around data files -> "I really want to make my own game" -> picking up a programming book at 13 -> a programming career.

22 -> make crud Java apps at a corporate software farm for a decade and lose faith in humanity

Spend a few years putting in 100-hour weeks writing collision detection for this year's Dora the Explorer game -- a typical game industry position -- and you will be thankful for the crud Java app job.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#505

Post by bitwize »

apostacy wrote: post #477
meko wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm envious because my parents heavily restricted my computer use thinking it'd rot my brain or I'd get r*ped. They wanted me reading books, to become a lawyer or a doctor. I always had an affinity for technology. My folks meant well but I think not watering that seed has me in the middle of this lost life.

I spent so many years yearning. It was so unfair that all of the other kids had Pentium computers at home, and all I had was an old 386. My parent's refused to get me a game console, or cable tv. I was SO BORED, in my desperation, I tried making games in QuickBASIC. I still think my parent's should not have gone so Amish, but I also don't think I would have developed as a programmer without that.

Not having access to a powerful computer makes you appreciate the finer things in life, like hand-bumming instructions till your inner loop hits a hard deadline.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#506

Post by HALtheWise »

drblast wrote: post #273

Google recruiters call me a lot. I think I'd do a good if not stellar job working there. I've passed multiple FAANG interviews and been very successful as a senior developer. In my email I have an "interview prep packet" from them that essentially tells me to brush up on algorithms and read Cracking the Coding Interview to prepare for their interview process. I'm fairly happy in my job. If they offered more money or…

Having recently gotten an offer after interviewing at Google, I can testify that those preparation packets are a sufficient but not necessary condition for doing well on an interview, and seem to be primarily targeted at making sure people who want to prepare don't do so badly. I spent about an hour on the plane reading through some example questions online, and did fine. I suspect that a lot of questions I "figured out" a clever solution to could actually have been solved with some obscure algorithm, but by treating them as puzzles rather than memorization tasks I was better able to demonstrate my skills as a candidate.

In short, I think the exact same question is interpreted as a cool algorithm challenge or a recall check, and the interviewer will be fine with you rederiving the answer on the spot if you are quick thinking enough to do so.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#507

Post by PopeDotNinja »

em-bee wrote: post #497
PopeDotNinja wrote: post #110

> However, whether or not a candidate answers a question correctly is not the only source of signal during an interview. You can also evaluate their process by, for example, observing how long it takes them to finish, how clean their code is, and how much they struggle while finding a solution. Our analysis shows that this second source of signal (process) is almost as predictive as the first (correctness). I seem to…

regarding the simpler solution, i just had that situation today. working on elevatorsaga.com the candidate clearly wanted to solve the full problem correctly (the way a real elevator works) from the get-go. however doing so would have taken him several hours without him knowing if he got any closer to a working solution. i had to push him to try something simpler first just so that he would get to somewhere meaningfu…

I hear what you're saying, I do. But if the candidate knows what an optimal solution is, and that optimal solution takes several hours, maybe you're asking a question that is too big?

For example, asking someone to write a self balancing binary search tree in an interview might be too much. And asking a question that ultimately demands using a self balancing BST might be a bit much. It's like asking a question that really needs an associative array, but then imposing the rule that associative arrays aren't available. How about simply asking the candidate about binary trees, if they've used them, and what they've used them for?

Last week an interviewer asked me about if I was familiar with the Egg Dropping problem (https://brilliant.org/wiki/egg-dropping/). I wasn't, but I remember saying something like, "I haven't done this one before, but I'm pretty sure it's going to take O(log n) guesses to find the max floor from which you can safely drop the egg." The interviewer asked me how I'd implement it, and then we got into the weeds when I started asking for what the requirements were. He wouldn't share any information about inputs & outputs, so I just started writing the dumbest thing possible, predictably coded myself into a corner, and burned a potential interview win-win on learning how answer that kind of question for that kind of interviewer.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#508

Post by Balgair »

pedrosorio wrote: post #464
Balgair wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if HackerRank has updated itself recently, but the last time I poked my head in there (years ago), all the answers were in the "Talk about this challenge" section. You'd just go in there and copy paste the code in, maybe change the variable names/order a bit. Ever since I learned that, it's never been that 'wowzers' for me.

"Ever since I learned that, it's never been that 'wowzers' for me." I am not sure I follow. For people who want to, there is a section where they can find answers even if they have not solved the problems. What was 'wowzers' about HackerRank before you learned that?

Well, some folks would brag about their score (years ago, dunno about now) and use that ranking as an indicator of their coding prowess. When I learned that the whole thing was easy to 'cheat' (whatever that mean in this context), then that rank lost all prestige for me.

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#509

Post by Balgair »

Izkata wrote: post #501
meko wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the whole point of the challenge to figure out how to do the problem? What you say is literally just copy/pasting others' answers. Is that not looked down on?

Given the name of the site (I've never used it), I always assumed it was about proving your ability to others (like maybe future employers). Easily-found answers totally destroys the trust that's needed for such a thing to work.

Bingo. Years back, in what small circles I run in, the score was something to toot your horn about. When I discovered that you could 'cheat' on the scoring, it took away all the prestige from that ranking score. Honestly, other than practice, what use is it?

Re: Harder programming questions do a worse job of predicting outcomes

#510

Post by toasterlovin »

devocracy wrote: post #494
x3n0ph3n3 wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's made me angry how many people I've interviewed who can't manage Fizz Buzz with only 2 conditions or at all.

I'm curious to find out what people define as fizzbuzz, do you have a good example of something you've asked in the past?

Print numbers from 1 to 100, except print Fizz for numbers evenly divisible by 3, print Buzz for numbers evenly divisible by 5, and print FizzBuzz for numbers divisible by both 3 and 5.
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