---------------------------------------- > Date: Fri, 16 May 2008 20:27:16 -0700 > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: Programming challenge > > Gabriel Sechan wrote: > >> While I firmly believe in seeing an applicant program, the problem >> with doing it ahead of time is that they'll find answers on the web, >> or get help from others. Otherwise this isn't too different from >> things I've asked people to whiteboard program. > > I don't consider this a problem. I'm going to make sure that they can > think on their feet, too. > > You adjust something simple in the problem statement, or, even better, > just give them an odd case and see how they work it out. > > My experience has been that so few people test the edge cases that > everybody misses one that I can hit them with. > > One of the best things along this line was actually not a problem > statement, it was simply this: > > "Send us 1000 lines of your best code." >
You'd never hear back from me. First off, most of my code is owned by my employer, I can't give it to you (BTW- I know a lot of good programmers who don't write a damn thing off the clock). What I do have tends to be far from my best- code written for my own uses is always sloppier, because I don't expect to maintain it- it just needs to work well enough. That's assuming I even wanted to give you the project- I may have kept it secret for a reason, I have a collection of "great ideas that would be worth money (given funding and time)". And I'm not going to write a quick kloc. Secondly, I have better things to do than jump through hoops- even if I had 1K lines of decent code, it would take too long to comment and clean up to an acceptable level. There's too many jobs out there, yours isn't worth the effort (this is a generic yours, not personal btw. Your job would have to be pretty amazing to be worth it, and at this stage in the process you'd have no reason to make me think it is). Thirdly- I don't like guessing games. And that's exactly what this is- guess what he wants to see. I've known far too many morons giving interviews who would ding me for stupid bullshit like brace style or not using their favorite notation. Fourthly- it isn't a fair competition. I'm fairly honest- if I was to do this, I'd give you my code. Most people aren't. They'll find 1K on the web, already pretty and hand it in. I'm not going to waste my time competing with that shit. I'd just move on to the next interview. Gabe -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
