[tall]

I don't really care for this style of interviewing. A technique that really works is to take a problem the company is currently facing, slim it down and present it to the candidate pre-interview. Then when he comes in you ask him to explain his solution, and the choices he made.

It allows the candidate to be far more relaxed and puts him in a situation a lot more akin to the work that he will be doing for your company.

[shittyanalogy]

It's also kind of sleazy as you're getting them to do work for you for no pay. I've been in interviews where similar questions were asked, and they had me go into more detail as I was actually solving problems for them.

[teh_klev]

Less sleazy would be to ask them to solve an already solved problem (whether you tell the candidate it's already solved or not is up to you).