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I think usually people who try to make this point are just pouting over how they shouldn't be expected to know basic, fundamental things. Like https://twitter.c

I think usually people who try to make this point are just pouting over how they shouldn't be expected to know basic, fundamental things. Like https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768 https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768

XorNot 5y ago
I can count on no hands the number of times I have ever needed to invert a binary tree in my entire career. I'm sure someone knows. I'm also sure that I don't care: why didn't they use the standard library function for it?
- lordlic 5y ago
  Beyond parody.
  - XorNot 5y ago
    For your consideration I direct you to the struggles of developing Starcraft: https://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/tough-times-on-the-road-to-starcraft https://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/tough-times-on-the-road-to-... Whereupon a huge proportion of early bugs were programmers who believed they were easily smart enough to write doubly linked list handling methods proceeded to ongoingly and continually screw up writing doubly linked list handling methods while refusing to use standard functions. This isn't hypothetical.
    - lordlic 5y ago
      There is no "standard library function" for inverting a binary tree. That's not a thing that exists, probably anywhere in any standard library for any language, and even if it did you should still know how to write it yourself. Also the article you linked doesn't argue that you shouldn't know how to write a linked list, it argues that you should implement ADT operations in functions instead of trying to wing it with ad-hoc logic all over the place. Blizzard's developers were definitely smart enough implement a doubly-linked list one time, they were just fallible humans who got tripped up consistently implementing the same logic in a hundred different places.
AussieWog93 5y ago
Honestly, I had things like WiX and CMake in my mind when responding to you, but the tweet you linked to seems pretty fair too. So many "nerdy" circles seem to be plagued by this subculture where your competence or intelligence is measured by how much obscure and useless knowledge you can accrue. The fact that Max's experience creating and maintaining the single best package manager on macOS (by a country mile, too) was considered less important than whether or not he knew the minutiae of a particular form of logic puzzle is bullshit, and I can completely synpathise him in that regard.
- lordlic 5y ago
  I actually do think you have a point about the fetishization of trivia knowledge in this field. It's really not ideal, and I think it's more driven by social dysfunction or over-compensation for various kinds of imposter syndrome. But that is not this. In the case of inverting a binary tree, what you call logic-puzzle minutiae is just taking a fundamental building block in computer science (binary trees) and asking the person to demonstrate even the faintest ability when it comes to writing an incredibly basic algorithm. Max Howell not only can't do it, but he doesn't even see why he should need to know how to do it! That kind of proud ignorance is what grinds my gears. I'm sure someone can gather requirements and deliver value to customers and fix bugs and string together code and everything without knowing how to work with trees, but I don't really care. If they've somehow gotten that far without even a glimmer of curiosity about the fundamentals of computer science then something is disturbingly wrong, and I would worry about what other mammoth blind spots they inexplicably have.
  - jcun4128 5y ago
    I should not comment on this chain, just adding clarity on my behalf... all I've done in my "career" is web related stuff, mostly JavaScript paired with a backend... I've never used BT/BST only recently learned it for myself just to know what it is. If you went through a CS path then I would say you should know about it. I'm trying to pick it up due to FOMO. I hear about it.
  - AussieWog93 5y ago
mancerayder 5y ago
It's hard to tell whether your comment was sarcastic or serious, but the guy invented homebrew, and was passed over for as you say, not knowing fundamental things. I'd flip the script in this narrative: by passing over the author of a wildly popular piece of software, the interviewers showed their missing knowledge of fundamental things - like good business sense. No thanks, Google. And what does Google invent, anyway, given that their biggest financial successes have been acquisitions?
UncleMeat 5y ago
Notably, he wasn't actually asked to invert a binary tree in the interview (this would not be a desirable question internally for anything other than screens) and he wasn't told why he failed the interview process. So given the response, I'm not certain that it wasn't his attitude during the interview process that sunk him.

XorNot 5y ago

I can count on no hands the number of times I have ever needed to invert a binary tree in my entire career. I'm sure someone knows. I'm also sure that I don't care: why didn't they use the standard library function for it?

lordlic 5y ago
Beyond parody.
- XorNot 5y ago
  For your consideration I direct you to the struggles of developing Starcraft: https://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/tough-times-on-the-road-to-starcraft https://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/tough-times-on-the-road-to-... Whereupon a huge proportion of early bugs were programmers who believed they were easily smart enough to write doubly linked list handling methods proceeded to ongoingly and continually screw up writing doubly linked list handling methods while refusing to use standard functions. This isn't hypothetical.
  - lordlic 5y ago
    There is no "standard library function" for inverting a binary tree. That's not a thing that exists, probably anywhere in any standard library for any language, and even if it did you should still know how to write it yourself. Also the article you linked doesn't argue that you shouldn't know how to write a linked list, it argues that you should implement ADT operations in functions instead of trying to wing it with ad-hoc logic all over the place. Blizzard's developers were definitely smart enough implement a doubly-linked list one time, they were just fallible humans who got tripped up consistently implementing the same logic in a hundred different places.

AussieWog93 5y ago

Honestly, I had things like WiX and CMake in my mind when responding to you, but the tweet you linked to seems pretty fair too. So many "nerdy" circles seem to be plagued by this subculture where your competence or intelligence is measured by how much obscure and useless knowledge you can accrue. The fact that Max's experience creating and maintaining the single best package manager on macOS (by a country mile, too) was considered less important than whether or not he knew the minutiae of a particular form of logic puzzle is bullshit, and I can completely synpathise him in that regard.

lordlic 5y ago
I actually do think you have a point about the fetishization of trivia knowledge in this field. It's really not ideal, and I think it's more driven by social dysfunction or over-compensation for various kinds of imposter syndrome. But that is not this. In the case of inverting a binary tree, what you call logic-puzzle minutiae is just taking a fundamental building block in computer science (binary trees) and asking the person to demonstrate even the faintest ability when it comes to writing an incredibly basic algorithm. Max Howell not only can't do it, but he doesn't even see why he should need to know how to do it! That kind of proud ignorance is what grinds my gears. I'm sure someone can gather requirements and deliver value to customers and fix bugs and string together code and everything without knowing how to work with trees, but I don't really care. If they've somehow gotten that far without even a glimmer of curiosity about the fundamentals of computer science then something is disturbingly wrong, and I would worry about what other mammoth blind spots they inexplicably have.
- jcun4128 5y ago
  I should not comment on this chain, just adding clarity on my behalf... all I've done in my "career" is web related stuff, mostly JavaScript paired with a backend... I've never used BT/BST only recently learned it for myself just to know what it is. If you went through a CS path then I would say you should know about it. I'm trying to pick it up due to FOMO. I hear about it.
- AussieWog93 5y ago

mancerayder 5y ago

It's hard to tell whether your comment was sarcastic or serious, but the guy invented homebrew, and was passed over for as you say, not knowing fundamental things. I'd flip the script in this narrative: by passing over the author of a wildly popular piece of software, the interviewers showed their missing knowledge of fundamental things - like good business sense. No thanks, Google. And what does Google invent, anyway, given that their biggest financial successes have been acquisitions?

UncleMeat 5y ago

Notably, he wasn't actually asked to invert a binary tree in the interview (this would not be a desirable question internally for anything other than screens) and he wasn't told why he failed the interview process. So given the response, I'm not certain that it wasn't his attitude during the interview process that sunk him.