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Invisible wrote:
>>> (E.g., I suspect if you applied to work for Google,
>> Not if their interview process is anything to go on.
> O RLY?
> You know something about this then?
Yeah. They saw my resume and wanted to interview me. So they asked me
stupid questions over the phone like you get in phone interview just to
see if you're a poseur or something.
But then, when I got there, there wasn't a single question about
anything I knew or anything I'd done. Not one word mentioned about
what's on my resume.
Plus, all the questions were these abstract programming questions, most
of which had nothing to do with the sort of things Google does.
"How do you efficiently tell if an integer is a power of two?" (It's
trivia - if you know the trick, you answer the question, and if you
don't, it's unlikely you'll come up with it in the middle of a job
interview.)
"You have a bunch of data you want to be able to insert, find, and
remove, and you want to be able to retrieve a random subset of size N of
that data." Well, use a hashtable, and take the first N entries.
"What if your hash function doesn't balance out well?" Can I assume I
know how to generate good random numbers, or is that what you're asking?
"You can assume you have random numbers." So I can write a good random
number generator, but I can't write a good hash function?
"You have 10,000 machines with 5,000 entries in a file on each. You want
to find the 100 most common entries in the file. Estimate how many
machines it'll take." Well, how fast do you want it? "Um, well, pick
a speed, and estimate how many machines it'll take." OK, run the
program on 100 machines going to 5 machines, then 100 machines going to
10 machines. Assuming that's roughly twice as fast, multiply that number
by 100, divide it by how fast you want it, and that's your number of
machines. "OK, do that." So, you want me to estimate how many machines
it takes to run an unknown program on unknown data at an unknown speed
and finish within an unspecified deadline, and you want me to estimate
that standing in front of the whiteboard at the job interview? "Yes."
"Find the smallest N numbers that fit the equation 2^i * 5^j for any
positive i and j." Struggles for a bit, realizes there's no obvious
pattern to it. Where do these numbers come from? "What?" What sort of
process generates or consumes numbers like this that I'd have to find
them? That'll give me a handle on what order they're in. "Just solve it."
"How would you estimate the cache size of a processor?" I'd look in the
source of memtest x86 and see what processor instructions it uses to
look that up in the CPU. "Say it's a different CPU." I'd ask the
manufacturer. "How would you do it with a program?" Why would I guess,
if I can actually determine it accurately at runtime? OK,here's some
code to do it. "What would make it's results invalid?" See?
Virtually none of the questions were connected with any sort of
scientific or business processes that I could figure out, except maybe
the "estimate merging files", for which "do it on a small sample and
multiply" wasn't acceptable for some reason.
Their system administration group did a better job on the questions.
Stuff like "if you try to log in and get told 'too many processes',
what's goign on and how do you fix it?" Or "name the bits in the TCP
headers." At least that was testing actual knowledge you might need if
you're administering machines.
--
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
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Tom Austin wrote:
> Get a book that doesn't just say hook this wire here and there, but that
> actually goes through how it all works.
Radio Shack in the USA used to carry little books like this. Maybe 20 or
30 half-size pages (folded over and stapled, basically) saying how to
make a counter, or a Xenon flash circuit ;-) or a tone generator. Of
course they had the RS part number lists at the back, which was
convenient since you were right there anyway. But they explained how it
worked, while other kit-companies just told you how to wire it up.
--
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
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"Mueen Nawaz" <m.n### [at] ieee org> wrote in message
news:491c5c3a$1@news.povray.org...
> Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>> Um... the obvious problem here is that I'm obviously not intelligent
>> enough to do a PhD. :-P
>
> Yes you are (compared to the folks I knew in grad school). And yes,
> Darren is correct: Perseverance and desire is a bigger factor than
> intelligence.
Agreed. It's the perserverance that I'm struggling with right now (even
though I'm just doing an M.Sc)
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On Wed, 12 Nov 2008 19:44:09 +0000, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>>>> And RedHat is currently selling more Linux than Novell. Turns out
>>>> customers *want* service contracts for things their business depends
>>>> on.
>>> OK. So why have I not heard anything about RedHat for several years?
>>
>> Very likely a product of your choice of reading material. Have you
>> looked at a copy of Linux Format lately? There recently was a huge
>> article there on training, specifically about RedHat training. With a
>> big ad in the middle of the article, at that.
>
> Woah - there's a "Linux Format" now? o_O
It's been around for a few years, current issue is (looking around desk)
112. 13 issues per year. You do the math. ;-)
You might also be surprised to learn that there is also one called "Linux
Journal". And yes, it's older.
> Mind you, there's enough people using Linux, I guess it makes sense...
There you go.
>>> Have they gone into some kind of specialised market or something? Once
>>> upon a time you used to hear of them quite a bit, and now they seem
>>> awful quiet...
>>
>> Nope, they haven't gone into a specialized market. They're losing
>> market share to Novell (which owns SUSE Linux) and to Canonical, but
>> absolutely still around.
>>
>> If you spend all your time around Windows advertising and gaming
>> magazines, you probably won't hear much about Linux. Though with the
>> MS/ Novell deal, Microsoft is selling SUSE Linux Enterprise Server to
>> their customers as well - surely you've heard of *that* deal? It's
>> been ongoing for about 2 years now....
>
> Actually, come to think of it, I *do* vaguely remember that
> announcement...
So, you want to keep up with the tech industry? Subscribe to a slashdot
RSS feed. Don't read the comments, read the stories. That'll give you a
good starting point to see what's going on in the world.
Jim
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On Thu, 13 Nov 2008 09:29:22 +0000, Invisible wrote:
>>> Yeah, it does - just not particularly often. ;-)
>>
>> Tell that to all of those employees here or at RedHat who get paid.
>>
>> But there is an added advantage to working on OSS projects - helps
>> build a resume and people can see your work.
>
> I'm not disputing that getting paid for OSS is a good idea - I'm just
> saying it's highly nontrivial to achieve this.
If it's non-trivial to fill out an application, then I guess you're
right. But you won't know UNTIL YOU TRY.
Jim
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Gail wrote:
> Agreed. It's the perserverance that I'm struggling with right now (even
> though I'm just doing an M.Sc)
IIRC, the final year of my BSc was pretty insane...
But then, I'm not good with time management. I tend to burn hours
working on "interesting" but irrelevant problems, and no time at all
working on the stuff that I don't know how to do.
--
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*
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Mike Raiford wrote:
> Tom Austin wrote:
>
>> I highly recommend either of the books if you are really interested in
>> learning some about electronics. Unless you have $100 in TTL chips, I
>> recommend that you go the CMOS route as it is more likely what you
>> would encounter when dealing with more specialized chips (think CPU).
>
> Just keep in mind CMOS is very easy to cook.
>
yes, they are easier than TTL to *damage*
TTL can withstand a bit more abuse before they peter out.
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>> I'm not disputing that getting paid for OSS is a good idea - I'm just
>> saying it's highly nontrivial to achieve this.
>
> If it's non-trivial to fill out an application, then I guess you're
> right. But you won't know UNTIL YOU TRY.
Gotta find somebody to apply to first. :-P Same as everything else...
--
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*
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Tom Austin wrote:
> yes, they are easier than TTL to *damage*
>
> TTL can withstand a bit more abuse before they peter out.
...and you think I'm using TTL because...? ;-)
--
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*
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"Orchid XP v8" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message
news:491c77d7$1@news.povray.org...
> Gail wrote:
>> Agreed. It's the perserverance that I'm struggling with right now (even
>> though I'm just doing an M.Sc)
>
> IIRC, the final year of my BSc was pretty insane...
Now try doing that, working full time and still keeping up with the tech
community (and contributing to it frequently)
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