[tdumitrescu]

In general, don't send out cold applications. Use the internet tools at your disposal and find someone inside each company that you're interested in, whether it's an in-house technical recruiter, engineering manager, or even an IC engineer who has interests related to yours. Don't send a resume, just make contact and feel them out about the potential of working there. This may lead to an initial "soft" screen before you can get to codin' but at that point you're in their pipeline for real. And you may also find out ahead of time that what they're really looking for isn't very closely related to the job postings you saw.