[kovac]

In one interview, I was given a timed hacker rank problem with a screen share with 2 interviewers. The sample tests passed and the real tests passed except for 2 (from what I remember) that timed out on large data sets. Before the tests were run, I already highlighted the part of the code that's the bottleneck and asked if I could copy the code to Visual Studio (the test was in C#) because the standard lib has a data structure for this use case that I hadn't used in a long time but I couldn't get the code to compile on hacker rank. I wasn't allowed to use the IDE and I was also denied access to the standard lib documentation (in front of then through the screen share). I couldn't implement the data structure within the time limit. I failed the interview. I still wonder what the point of that test was.

[roland35]

I always feel like that type of coding interview is a sort of engineering hazing. I know I am often consulting documentation, especially when working in a new problem-space or less familiar programming language!

I always try to give candidates the benefit of doubt with silly things like syntax or whatever since it's not like I'm interviewing for a live coding performer!