[chrisbennet]

It isn't supposed to be a test of whether you know the modulo operator but in practice it works out that way.

True story; my wife was going over her (correct) answers to a coding test with the interviewer and he asked her "What's this?" in reference to the modulus operator. The interviewer didn't recognize it.

I use the modulus operator almost daily so it seems obvious to me but I realize that everyone has different experiences or things they are ignorant about. IMO, fizzbuzz is a test of whether you know the modulus operator "trick".

[lutusp]

> It isn't supposed to be a test of whether you know the modulo operator but in practice it works out that way.

Yep. And at HN, actually knowing this or anything else assures that you will be downvoted with a probability of 1.

> I use the modulus operator almost daily so it seems obvious to me but I realize that everyone has different experiences or things they are ignorant about.

I see the modulo operator applied to a common undergraduate math question -- if a given date lands on a Tuesday, and if you add 500 days, what day of the week does the result land on?