[Web4lib] test ideas for web job candidates

[Deborah Kaplan]

On Sun, 15 Oct 2006, Ross Singer wrote:

> On 10/14/06, Eric Hellman <eric at openly.com> wrote:
> > When I hire people to do programming I look for an aesthetic sense
> > and for pride of craftsmanship. I don't give people stupid tests, I
> > look at things they've done and want to show me. I avoid candidates
> > with resumes full of lists of technologies, I look for people who are
> > engrossed in problems and their solutions.
> 
> I can't begin to express how wise I think this approach is.  I see all
> too often departments try to quiz the specific skills of an
> individual, or develop elaborate tests to see the programming
> knowledge of a person -- and this is really missing the point.
> Incredibly strong in a language does not make a good developer; Eric
> mentions the aesthetics and I would like to add vision to the pile.
> These skills are /much, much/ more important than clean code, because
> experience will lead to cleaner code, vision to see a larger picture
> cannot. 

I have to disagree with this, it least if your programmer is
doing anything more complex than writing HTML/CSS with a little
bit of JavaScript animations. A good programming test isn't to
see whether or not your programmer knows how to do something
specific in C or Java -- it's always easy to teach a programmer
a new language. It's to see whether or not your programmer knows
the basic principles of writing efficient code. Does she
understand how to parse all the items in the database that's
being searched without creating a massive memory leak? Does she
know how to run her search in an efficient fashion, or know the
pros and cons of hash tables? None of this has to be in any
particular programming language -- a programmer can talk you
through these processes in English and you will still learn that
she is good at her job.

I also disagree with the sentiment that it is easier to teach a
non-programmer programming than a programmer something new. You
can teach anybody how to write "hello world" in Prolog, Ada, or
the language of your choice. But to teach somebody how to write
efficient, fast, non-memory-leaking code is much more difficult.
In exactly the same way that anybody can look at a book and say
"I think this book is about dogs!", but learning cataloging and
classification is a trained skill.

All that being said, if what you want is simple webpages with
HTML/CSS and a few simple animations, than you don't need fast
and efficient code. You ABSOLUTELY still need somebody who
understands the basic principles of usability and accessibility
knows how to code to them.

But if you are doing something complex, then I respectfully
disagree with the previous posters who have referred to
programming tests as "stupid". Anybody can BS competent
programming in an interview where just talk about problem
solving, but a question such as "how would you solve this simple
problem in pseudocode" reveals an enormous amount about whether
or not the person you are speaking to is actually comfortable
with computers.

Deborah Kaplan