Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by jjav 1767 days ago
> So we're discussing a hypothetical developer who has "no interest towards algorithms", and you're imagining that this person is going to run a profiler to troubleshoot a performance issue and subsequently optimize algorithms to fix said performance issue? This sounds like a fantasy to me.

Our experiences are vastly different then. Nothing fantasy or hypothetical about this. Every great software engineer I've worked with is like this.

Profiling and identifying hot spots is an every-week occurrence in the field, very pragmatic and valuable work. Theoretical algorithms only happen on interview whiteboards, not on the job.
1 comments
baobabKoodaa 1767 days ago
You're arguing that someone who doesn't care to learn anything about algorithms is going to do a good job at optimizing algorithms.
link
jjav 1766 days ago
No, not at all!

I am saying that being able to regurgitate an implementation of quicksort (to keep on the sorting example) onto a whiteboard is not a useful skill. There will never be a need to do this in a real life job.

The truly useful skill is being able (and interested!) in using a profiler to find bottlenecks, identify what is being done there (let's say, sorting) and being able to find a better replacement algorithm in the literature and change to code to use a well-optimized implementation (which exists already in just about every ecosystem, no need to reimplement it from memory).

link
baobabKoodaa 1766 days ago
> I am saying that being able to regurgitate an implementation of quicksort (to keep on the sorting example) onto a whiteboard is not a useful skill.

In that case I'm not sure why you're arguing against me, because I've repeatedly expressed my dislike towards algorithm memorization. I don't believe memorizing algorithms is useful at all. It might give a very small edge in competitive programming, but it's not what competitive programming is about either. The best competitors have amazing skills at creating algorithms to solve problems ("create" as opposed to "memorize").

If you look up the parent thread, you started arguing against me when I said "Developers who have no interest towards algorithms will not [be good at some things]".

link