[mortdeus]

If im ever being interviewed by Google, i'm going to say "hold up let me google the solution to that real quick."

A good engineer spends about 95% of their time discovering new things to learn about their craft. An even better engineer uses what other engineers have already discovered and shared with the world to further their understanding.

If the world only consisted of the "even better" engineers things like this wouldnt ever exist. http://swtch.com/~rsc/regexp/regexp1.html

When I hear, "I want you to develop a mini google.", I feel that the only right answer to the question is, "No thats not a problem that needs to be fixed anymore. Lets actually fix a real world problem that affects real world people."

There are very few new generation software engineers that are truly hackers at heart. Its really sad when a company like Google doesnt even know how to look for them anymore.

[tzs]

> If im ever being interviewed by Google, i'm going to say "hold up let me google the solution to that real quick."

If Google just wanted people to take existing publicly known parts and hook them together, they would be recruiting people fresh out of community college instead of fresh out of masters and PhD programs, and they'd be offering around $50k/year salary.

Google is trying to find people who can create the parts that ordinary programmers hook together.

[tptacek]

I can't hire IT in Chicago for $50k/yr.

[hackinthebochs]

I really can't get behind this kind of thinking. If you can't do what came before, how you plan on advancing the state of the art? Knowledge is hierarchical, one cannot get by forever by just googling the answer to everything if you're expected to be pushing new boundaries. Testing if you know the fundamentals is legitimate, even if there's already a million implementations of them on the web.

[goatslacker]

While you're not expected to be an encyclopedia of knowledge about any particular language, framework, or API; having the frequent need to look things up is a red flag because if you're always looking things up you may not move fast enough.

Also, having the "this is not a problem" attitude is a red flag; what else would this person not consider a problem when I hire them?

[enscr]

you might miss out on a lot of bright bulbs if you keep red-flagging them because you think they won't move fast enough.

[goatslacker]

I may; hiring is tough. You only have a few minutes to gauge whether you'll work well with that person or not and bad signals are bad signals. I can't green light all candidates just in case.

It all depends on the tone and the body language and if they're able to continue with guidance.

[garthdog]

Then you've turned the interview into a waste of time. There is no actionable information that is produced from that answer.

If you honestly are looking for a job and aren't looking to make some kind of F-U 2 The Man statement, do yourself a favor and don't give an answer like that.

[alecbenzer]

This just seems silly to say.

If you were asked to write a regex engine as an exercise you'd say "No thats not a problem that needs to be fixed anymore."?

How would you expect to be able to improve performance of regex engines without understanding how a basic regex engine works?