[kofejnik]

strongly disagree

1. you _won't_ be happier running a fast food joint - the work is gruelling, and it's so easy to go bust. And you won't bring home six figures

2a. people who _actually_ can code are scarce, even in the tech industry. Source: conducted over 300 interviews

2b. quite logically, your coding skill will be most appreciated and compensated at a Big Tech Co, not at a government department where they will be simply unable to see the difference

[jason0597]

>2a. people who _actually_ can code are scarce, even in the tech industry. Source: conducted over 300 interviews

As a young person with an interest in software programming (currently studying chemical engineering but still write C code now and then), what do you look for when trying to find out people who can _actually_ code?

[HeyLaughingBoy]

Literally the ability to write working code. You'd be amazed how few interviewees can even put together a working for... loop.

[andrewnc]

This absolutely blows my mind. I have a hard time even believing it. But having never conducted interviews, I just don't know.

[jason0597]

I've heard this story before, but it sounds absolutely insane and I can't begin to imagine (let alone expect!) that such a thing occurs. Is it really true?

[kofejnik]

yes, exactly this

[kofejnik]

a somewhat serious answer: simple things should be easy to you, and hard things possible

examples of simple things: DFS/BFS walks; simple Project Euler problems; or "write a simple game in terminal, maybe with some form of minimax search" (a bit harder), or maybe a parser for simple arithmetic expressions