Enough with the Programming Puzzles
I&#x27;m actually in the middle of a bunch of interviews right now. The most ridiculous interview process I encountered so far was one that was supposed to be 7 (!!) steps long (that usually takes 3-4 weeks by their own estimates), beginning with a 45 minute HackerRank challenge, then a technical project that was said to take 2-5 hours on average (but the time given was a whole week, so I have my doubts about that estimate), followed by up to 4 Skype calls, and finally an onsite.<p>The HackerRank challenge consisted of two relatively trivial multiple choice problems, a simple FizzBuzz-level coding problem, and a programming puzzle. And I do mean programming <i>puzzle</i>. I consider it a puzzle in the sense that it had very little to do with any classical CS domain I&#x27;m aware of (although that may just be an artifact of my own ignorance, but to someone unaware of that domain like myself, it as might as well just be a puzzle) and certainly wasn&#x27;t anything one would ever encounter in front-end development (I was applying as a front-end engineer). I later found the problem online and here&#x27;s a thread discussing it for those interested (the company I interviewed with wasn&#x27;t Google though): <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;stackoverflow.com&#x2F;questions&#x2F;28967020&#x2F;check-if-there-exists-a-circle" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;stackoverflow.com&#x2F;questions&#x2F;28967020&#x2F;check-if-there-e...</a><p>I finished the 2 MC questions and first coding problem within the first 5 minutes, but I wasn&#x27;t able to finish the programming puzzle in the time remaining (For what it&#x27;s worth, I was on the right track with my approach, but it took me a lot of trial and error to arrive at that approach, so I didn&#x27;t have enough time left to finish the implementation). I got my rejection email two days later.<p>I really question the wisdom of using a programming puzzle like this as a filter in the first step of your interview process (or really, in any step of the interview process for that matter). You&#x27;re effectively discarding candidates solely based on their inability to solve an esoteric programming puzzle under some arbitrary time constraint.<p>Although at the end of the day, I&#x27;m not that disappointed in this early rejection. If this programming puzzle was a sign of things to come in the next 6 steps of their interview process, I think I may have dodged a bullet. That could have been so many hours of my life that I&#x27;d never get back. Good riddance I say.