[jtsiskin]

Yes - after “Recruiter: wrong, not "attributes", it's "metadata".” - it’s clear enough what’s happening. “stat() return an error code, not an inode” - I know this isn’t what’s on the paper, and the author should have also. “stat() let you get the inode number” would have let you stay pedantically correct yet still satisfy the recruiter.

“What is the type of the packets exchanged to establish a TCP connection?” - as soon as I read the question, I knew right away the author would give the exact hex, and the recruiter would want the three letter acronyms.

Perhaps this was a brilliant engineer disguising a personality interview as a technical one. Personally I would want my coworker or boss to be someone with enough awareness to have passed this interview. Compassion, empathy, social awareness, understanding someone else’s role and perspective, setting aside your ego to help a conversation go smoothly - important for a director to have.