If I'm quizzing you as part of a technical intervew [modified]
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I've worked at places like that. If I ever get another easy interview, I'm running far away from that place.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
Andy Brummer wrote:
If I ever get another easy interview, I'm running far away from that place.
On the other hand, I've had a few very tough interviews and once in the job found the other developers/managers still didn't know what they were talking about. They just looked up the questions to ask online instead of concentrating on the things they actually use. Let's ask lots of questions about LINQ. We don't use it, but we better make sure this guy knows it.
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You don't get an out by telling me my questions are a bunch of book learning. :sigh: [edit] I think my tone is throwing this discussion off. If I was getting waylaid in the middle of an interview, I'd figure out a way to work my message into my answers, not get confrontational with the interviewer. There were number of other things going on, this one was just a surprise to me. [/edit]
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
modified on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 4:48 PM
granted saying "bunch of book learning" is just shooting yourself in the foot, you as the interviewer have a certain responsibility when running a tech interview. The last one I was in, I Ohhh so happily bombed it. And no I did not sabotage. Here is how it went. First I sailed through both the hirring manager and the president of the company (small company mind you), and then the Tech interview (I know.. odd order but whatever). So all is going well and I am told the company is small (well duh) and everyone works closely together. Well so far so good. You all seem nice. So lets go meet our lead developer (cause he is sooo smart and all) :zzz: I walk into his office and well lets just say first impressions were not good, with him wearing a fashionable tight work out shirt and a beer gut a long with his trendy Elvis burns. I thought, well what ever. I know there was a time period when I thought it was kewl to... hmmm. Yea, I got nothing. I was never that bad. Anyways, I sit down and he gives the "Well I don't want to insult you but I am gonna ask some straight forward programming questions". (:omg: I am sooo unprepared. What am I doing here? I thought this was McDonalds!) So he started out simple. Whats a class? Define a class. Lead into inheritance and some other topics. And at this point I already realized he was a tool. Why? He asked me to have a class inherit from an interface. So I wrote that. He said "Oh I meant class". Ok, whatever so I erase the word interface and replaced it will class. He then looked at his computer screen and said "And what about and interface" :wtf: At this point I was ready to sabotage. I mean I knew I couldn't work with this guy. But I kept going. There were a few tougher ones and here was the key. If I did not answer the exact way he would so "Thats OK" and start the next. No conversation and no thought. At first I thought well whatever. Maybe I was off. I don't have google in front of me like this genius (man he must be so freaking smart). The last straw was this. "So other than an incrimenting integer what makes a good primary key for a data base". "Well, lets see. You could use a Date Time Stamp." And of course his responce "Thats OK". I continued with "Or a string, or a GUID or many other things. Really it depends on the context of the situation" "Oh that is the answer I was looking for. GUID" :wtf: :omg: :wtf: The point to all of this. Don't ask to see if they no the answer that you know. Sometimes asnwers are purely acronyms in fact
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If you claim to be a senior developer skilled at optimizing sql queries, I think asking to define a clustered index and materialized view is well within the bounds of an interview. I was disappointed I didn't even get into the different kinds of joins, etc.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
I actually see clustered indexes and materialized views as more advanced than different types of joins.
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I actually see clustered indexes and materialized views as more advanced than different types of joins.
If you are talking about inner, outer, etc. then yes definitely. If you are talking about hash, loop, etc. in the query execution plans then no.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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Did you take the job?
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
They said he wasn't experienced enough.
Forgive your enemies - it messes with their heads
My blog | My articles | MoXAML PowerToys | Mole 2010 - debugging made easier - my favourite utility
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granted saying "bunch of book learning" is just shooting yourself in the foot, you as the interviewer have a certain responsibility when running a tech interview. The last one I was in, I Ohhh so happily bombed it. And no I did not sabotage. Here is how it went. First I sailed through both the hirring manager and the president of the company (small company mind you), and then the Tech interview (I know.. odd order but whatever). So all is going well and I am told the company is small (well duh) and everyone works closely together. Well so far so good. You all seem nice. So lets go meet our lead developer (cause he is sooo smart and all) :zzz: I walk into his office and well lets just say first impressions were not good, with him wearing a fashionable tight work out shirt and a beer gut a long with his trendy Elvis burns. I thought, well what ever. I know there was a time period when I thought it was kewl to... hmmm. Yea, I got nothing. I was never that bad. Anyways, I sit down and he gives the "Well I don't want to insult you but I am gonna ask some straight forward programming questions". (:omg: I am sooo unprepared. What am I doing here? I thought this was McDonalds!) So he started out simple. Whats a class? Define a class. Lead into inheritance and some other topics. And at this point I already realized he was a tool. Why? He asked me to have a class inherit from an interface. So I wrote that. He said "Oh I meant class". Ok, whatever so I erase the word interface and replaced it will class. He then looked at his computer screen and said "And what about and interface" :wtf: At this point I was ready to sabotage. I mean I knew I couldn't work with this guy. But I kept going. There were a few tougher ones and here was the key. If I did not answer the exact way he would so "Thats OK" and start the next. No conversation and no thought. At first I thought well whatever. Maybe I was off. I don't have google in front of me like this genius (man he must be so freaking smart). The last straw was this. "So other than an incrimenting integer what makes a good primary key for a data base". "Well, lets see. You could use a Date Time Stamp." And of course his responce "Thats OK". I continued with "Or a string, or a GUID or many other things. Really it depends on the context of the situation" "Oh that is the answer I was looking for. GUID" :wtf: :omg: :wtf: The point to all of this. Don't ask to see if they no the answer that you know. Sometimes asnwers are purely acronyms in fact
Collin Jasnoch wrote:
You could use a Date Time Stamp
Collin Jasnoch wrote:
Or a string, or a GUID or many other things.
I'm sorry, the answer I was looking for was "multiple columns", but I would have accepted "multiple fields". You fired!
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Andy Brummer wrote:
If I ever get another easy interview, I'm running far away from that place.
On the other hand, I've had a few very tough interviews and once in the job found the other developers/managers still didn't know what they were talking about. They just looked up the questions to ask online instead of concentrating on the things they actually use. Let's ask lots of questions about LINQ. We don't use it, but we better make sure this guy knows it.
I've learned to ask a lot of questions about any place I work. If they are just going to go through a bunch of language and api trivia for an interview, that would be a red flag too.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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If you are talking about inner, outer, etc. then yes definitely. If you are talking about hash, loop, etc. in the query execution plans then no.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
Oh gotcha, I too see those as more advanced.
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Did you take the job?
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
NOO! ...it was at some university labs... pay was crap but the benefits were decent... but I decided I didn't like the super laid back attitude...
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They said he wasn't experienced enough.
Forgive your enemies - it messes with their heads
My blog | My articles | MoXAML PowerToys | Mole 2010 - debugging made easier - my favourite utility
:laugh:
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Oh gotcha, I too see those as more advanced.
Yeah, the basic level question I started with was finding duplicate rows in a table. It's an ancient question that I got a lot in the 90's. I also take a shotgun approach to asking questions. Nobody is going to be strong in all areas, so I try to ask a number of different questions that are key parts to solving problems that I've had to do repeatedly. If you are going to optimize SQL server for a particular work load, you need to know the different kinds of indexes, how to read an execution plan, indexed/materialized views, understanding how things change when you normalize/denormalize etc. Saying that you just run the wizard to create your indexes is not a good answer. :-D The thing that gets me is that I start off with general programming questions like: What makes good code? What is your experience with agile development? What does it mean to you? Pluses, minuses. Do you have any rules when writing code that you won't break. What makes a good vs. bad comment? etc.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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granted saying "bunch of book learning" is just shooting yourself in the foot, you as the interviewer have a certain responsibility when running a tech interview. The last one I was in, I Ohhh so happily bombed it. And no I did not sabotage. Here is how it went. First I sailed through both the hirring manager and the president of the company (small company mind you), and then the Tech interview (I know.. odd order but whatever). So all is going well and I am told the company is small (well duh) and everyone works closely together. Well so far so good. You all seem nice. So lets go meet our lead developer (cause he is sooo smart and all) :zzz: I walk into his office and well lets just say first impressions were not good, with him wearing a fashionable tight work out shirt and a beer gut a long with his trendy Elvis burns. I thought, well what ever. I know there was a time period when I thought it was kewl to... hmmm. Yea, I got nothing. I was never that bad. Anyways, I sit down and he gives the "Well I don't want to insult you but I am gonna ask some straight forward programming questions". (:omg: I am sooo unprepared. What am I doing here? I thought this was McDonalds!) So he started out simple. Whats a class? Define a class. Lead into inheritance and some other topics. And at this point I already realized he was a tool. Why? He asked me to have a class inherit from an interface. So I wrote that. He said "Oh I meant class". Ok, whatever so I erase the word interface and replaced it will class. He then looked at his computer screen and said "And what about and interface" :wtf: At this point I was ready to sabotage. I mean I knew I couldn't work with this guy. But I kept going. There were a few tougher ones and here was the key. If I did not answer the exact way he would so "Thats OK" and start the next. No conversation and no thought. At first I thought well whatever. Maybe I was off. I don't have google in front of me like this genius (man he must be so freaking smart). The last straw was this. "So other than an incrimenting integer what makes a good primary key for a data base". "Well, lets see. You could use a Date Time Stamp." And of course his responce "Thats OK". I continued with "Or a string, or a GUID or many other things. Really it depends on the context of the situation" "Oh that is the answer I was looking for. GUID" :wtf: :omg: :wtf: The point to all of this. Don't ask to see if they no the answer that you know. Sometimes asnwers are purely acronyms in fact
I do do help them along to make sure it just isn't an issue with forgetting terms. I'm more interested if finding out if they understand the concepts than making sure they have the lingo down.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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In SQL server it's also called an indexed view. I used both terms for the interview.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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You don't get an out by telling me my questions are a bunch of book learning. :sigh: [edit] I think my tone is throwing this discussion off. If I was getting waylaid in the middle of an interview, I'd figure out a way to work my message into my answers, not get confrontational with the interviewer. There were number of other things going on, this one was just a surprise to me. [/edit]
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
modified on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 4:48 PM
I do not know anything about what questions you asked to know whether they were bookish or not. Personally, I do not have any faith in bookish questions. Because a smart developer, if he/she does not know certain thing, can easily learn them. What I try to do is to evaluate a candidate on 2 things :- 1. Ability to solve problems - nothing is better than a simple coding problem. It does not matter whether the candidate gets the answer right but the way he approaches the problem reveals a lot about him/her. 2. Ability to learn - How quickly he can learn that is also obvious from coding interviews. In the end, a programmer is there to solve problems not how much knowledge he has. I have not seen anyone who knows everything or remembers everything. I know of a programmer who had no idea on how to right Oracle PL/SQL procedures. He did not work on Oracle before. But he was tasked with writing an important piece of logic. Not only he learned it within a week but he did such an excellent job that puts many full-time Oracle developers to shame.
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I do not know anything about what questions you asked to know whether they were bookish or not. Personally, I do not have any faith in bookish questions. Because a smart developer, if he/she does not know certain thing, can easily learn them. What I try to do is to evaluate a candidate on 2 things :- 1. Ability to solve problems - nothing is better than a simple coding problem. It does not matter whether the candidate gets the answer right but the way he approaches the problem reveals a lot about him/her. 2. Ability to learn - How quickly he can learn that is also obvious from coding interviews. In the end, a programmer is there to solve problems not how much knowledge he has. I have not seen anyone who knows everything or remembers everything. I know of a programmer who had no idea on how to right Oracle PL/SQL procedures. He did not work on Oracle before. But he was tasked with writing an important piece of logic. Not only he learned it within a week but he did such an excellent job that puts many full-time Oracle developers to shame.
very true!
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Yeah, the basic level question I started with was finding duplicate rows in a table. It's an ancient question that I got a lot in the 90's. I also take a shotgun approach to asking questions. Nobody is going to be strong in all areas, so I try to ask a number of different questions that are key parts to solving problems that I've had to do repeatedly. If you are going to optimize SQL server for a particular work load, you need to know the different kinds of indexes, how to read an execution plan, indexed/materialized views, understanding how things change when you normalize/denormalize etc. Saying that you just run the wizard to create your indexes is not a good answer. :-D The thing that gets me is that I start off with general programming questions like: What makes good code? What is your experience with agile development? What does it mean to you? Pluses, minuses. Do you have any rules when writing code that you won't break. What makes a good vs. bad comment? etc.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
Andy Brummer wrote:
What makes good code?
AspDotNetDev.
Andy Brummer wrote:
What is your experience with agile development?
My previous manager had a license plate, "AGILE" (I shit you not).
Andy Brummer wrote:
What does it mean to you?
Sex.
Andy Brummer wrote:
Pluses, minuses.
++--
Andy Brummer wrote:
Do you have any rules
If necessary, horizontal, though I usually just prefer line numbers.
Andy Brummer wrote:
code that you won't break.
If I don't have an IDE handy, I will sometimes debug JavaScript without breakpoints.
Andy Brummer wrote:
What makes a good vs. bad comment?
Good - AspDotNetDev. Bad - the IDE.
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I do do help them along to make sure it just isn't an issue with forgetting terms. I'm more interested if finding out if they understand the concepts than making sure they have the lingo down.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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I've worked at places like that. If I ever get another easy interview, I'm running far away from that place.
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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nice!
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
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You don't get an out by telling me my questions are a bunch of book learning. :sigh: [edit] I think my tone is throwing this discussion off. If I was getting waylaid in the middle of an interview, I'd figure out a way to work my message into my answers, not get confrontational with the interviewer. There were number of other things going on, this one was just a surprise to me. [/edit]
Curvature of the Mind now with 3D
modified on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 4:48 PM
I always worry when people start talking about "in the real world" or "not too much of the high falutin' theory" or "too much book learning" a) We don't live in the real world, I mean we do, but our work doesn't it lives in computers b) The computers rely on & implement the high falutin' theory, so a knowledge of that just might come in handy. Got my 5. OT, you are named in this[^] thread asking about licensing on an old article of yours.
Sort of a cross between Lawrence of Arabia and Dilbert.[^]
-Or-
A Dead ringer for Kate Winslett[^]