|
At the risk of sounding like old man yelling at clouds, anecdotally many of the 20-something devs I work with are unfamiliar with a lot of concepts we used to take for granted. Things like using a command line and common tools, shell scripting, generally how OSes work, anything close to hardware at all, stuff like that. I don't claim to be expert but it used to be nearly unavoidable that you picked up some things along the way. A small piece of me dies watching their mostly GUI-based dev workflows, and then when they do need to stumble through something on the cli it's like a foreign language. And I'm not even a diehard terminal guy. I primarily use JetBrains IDEs! But I'm still in and out of the terminal all the time. A little while back when MacOS switched its default from bash to zsh I made some comment about how I spent like an hour moving over some stuff from my bash profile and blinged out zsh with p10k and all the whippersnappers looked at me like I had a third eye. "Okay, old man, who even uses that stuff?" I'm 36
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 06:21 |
|
|
# ? May 27, 2024 02:53 |
|
hendersa posted:Do any of you receive unsolicited e-mails from students or junior engineers that are asking for a job? I was gonna say never, but then I remembered that I actually did, back when I worked for university -> they were looking for a PhD positions though. Pretty much always some Indian dude. Never after that though.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 08:59 |
|
prom candy posted:Is this poo poo gonna go the way of the trades where we don't let any new blood in and then in a few years when we're all old and retiring companies go "wait gently caress how come nobody knows how to do any of this stuff" Its fine AI will save us!
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 09:41 |
|
Guinness posted:At the risk of sounding like old man yelling at clouds, anecdotally many of the 20-something devs I work with are unfamiliar with a lot of concepts we used to take for granted. Things like using a command line and common tools, shell scripting, generally how OSes work, anything close to hardware at all, stuff like that. My team's several recent new hires seem very comfortable on the command line, at least.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 16:59 |
|
Mega Comrade posted:Its fine AI will save us! one of my biggest use cases for chatgpt is command line stuff. i wrote a little script (actually i asked chatgpt how to do that and copied the code) that talks to the chatgpt and tells it to pretend to be a command line expert that i can run from the cli, and if i get stuck i just run that script and ask it what i want to do. i'll be able to file my cli knowledge along with my knowledge of how to write modem initialization strings soon.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 17:13 |
|
Just got through another technical interview where they "don't judge you based on if your code works (It did), but based on your thought process (your vibes)". At one point one of the interviewers pointed out that I said one of the words/phrases they were looking for. I think it was "scale" in the context of "how does this algorithm scale for extremely large inputs". Anyways, feeling super confident I'll be getting an offer soon.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 18:09 |
|
ZShakespeare posted:Just got through another technical interview where they "don't judge you based on if your code works (It did), but based on your thought process (your vibes)". At one point one of the interviewers pointed out that I said one of the words/phrases they were looking for. I think it was "scale" in the context of "how does this algorithm scale for extremely large inputs". Anyways, feeling super confident I'll be getting an offer soon. Thought process isn't just vibes, it's a way of showing how you think through an issue. Sure, it's not a totally objective measure either but I've interviewed on vibes before and it's a very different approach.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 20:54 |
|
Bruegels Fuckbooks posted:if i get stuck i just run that script and ask it what i want to do. i'll be able to file my cli knowledge along with my knowledge of how to write modem initialization strings soon.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 21:58 |
|
Falcon2001 posted:Thought process isn't just vibes, it's a way of showing how you think through an issue. Sure, it's not a totally objective measure either but I've interviewed on vibes before and it's a very different approach. code:
edit: five minutes. edit 2, ok now im gonna put it in a pre block because the forums messed up my formatting
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 22:03 |
|
Bruegels Fuckbooks posted:one of my biggest use cases for chatgpt is command line stuff. i wrote a little script (actually i asked chatgpt how to do that and copied the code) that talks to the chatgpt and tells it to pretend to be a command line expert that i can run from the cli, and if i get stuck i just run that script and ask it what i want to do. i'll be able to file my cli knowledge along with my knowledge of how to write modem initialization strings soon. They were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should.
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 22:03 |
|
Falcon2001 posted:Thought process isn't just vibes, it's a way of showing how you think through an issue. Sure, it's not a totally objective measure either but I've interviewed on vibes before and it's a very different approach. You are, of course, correct. It's not vibes. It's your grasp on the english language, and your ability to spew out overly verbose gpt summaries of "cracking the coding interview".
|
# ? Aug 30, 2023 22:30 |
|
ZShakespeare posted:You are, of course, correct. It's not vibes. It's your grasp on the english language, and your ability to spew out overly verbose gpt summaries of "cracking the coding interview". As it turns out, being able to discuss engineering concepts, such as why you picked a solution, how you're going to implement it, and discussion around it is extremely relevant to being a developer on a team of any size and any maturity. Sure, a totally junior hire, or a mid-career hire at a company that can't afford higher standards might be willing to skip on it, but are you seriously going to say that 'being able to talk about code' is somehow an arcane anti-pattern of development interviews? I'm not asking an candidate to be eloquent or write poetry. Almost my entire team speaks english as a second language and every single one of them should be able to talk about their code. If your grasp of whatever language is used in the workplace is so low you can't discuss your work, that's a real problem at any company or position. And the higher up you get in seniority the more important all of those points are, because a senior's job is mostly about explaining concepts to people. Achmed Jones posted:
I'm a little wary of rubrics as rules but yes, I agree you have some pre-determined categories of what is good vs negative about a candidate. The reason I'm a little wary of rubrics is that they can turn into the sort of a hidden list of problems to solve, which I'm not a fan of, but I think they're useful for trying to remove personal bias. Ideally I'd prefer to tell the candidate everything I want them to show up front as much as I can without spoiling it. 'Oh gently caress I need to talk about horizontal scaling now'; the other way I'd approach this would be to ask questions like 'How would you adjust this if it had to run concurrently 100 times or more?' or some other way that brings up the topic without giving the answer. It's not easy, obviously, and part of the reason it's not easy is that it's not 100% objective...and if it was, people would game it immediately, the same way that resumes are all gamed and terrible. Falcon2001 fucked around with this message at 01:35 on Aug 31, 2023 |
# ? Aug 31, 2023 01:16 |
|
rubrics alone are a great way to codify your biases, and bin otherwise good candidates because they didn't tic the hidden check boxes and use the right shibboleths. everyone can pat themselves on the back for being objective, however. I agree it's best to be upfront with the candidate and direct in the question. If some marker is on the rubric as a pass/fail, maybe blow it out into 3 pass/fails and ask questions regarding each category until they pass or it's clear they won't pass it
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 02:16 |
|
when the rubric is insufficient, you update it. it is not a replacement for giving a poo poo. if you justify stupid crap with your rubric, or the rubric itself is crap, that's kinda on you. and if you can't give the rubric to the candidate, well, that's probably not so great either maybe work on what's going on there.
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 02:29 |
|
Had an interviewer who appeared to be walking on a treadmill today
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 02:51 |
|
spiritual bypass posted:Had an interviewer who appeared to be walking on a treadmill today Perhaps a cryptic way of warning you you'll go nowhere in that company
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 05:18 |
|
prom candy posted:Perhaps a cryptic way of warning you you'll go nowhere in that company "Can you tell me about your most aspirational Greek mythical figure, and why it's Sysiphus?"
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 05:45 |
|
The internal recruiter told me tgis would be a Python centered interview where I'd need to collaborate and think ahead about performance. Instead, I got a system design interview where my every attempt to think ahead and design for capacity (asking about next year's revenue goals, etc) was shot down with "no, we just need a design we can have ready for market in 2 weeks." The interviewer seemed like he had no idea how to run the process and I keep getting madder about it as I dwell on it. Ended up with a monolith backed by a relational database, which isn't exactly my maximum design knowhow.
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 22:56 |
|
spiritual bypass posted:Had an interviewer who appeared to be walking on a treadmill today I know a guy that takes all his meetings on a treadmill, wouldn't be shocked if he did interviews that way as well. He got really sick, then got serious about getting healthy and walks like 30k steps/day. If you can manage it without being a distraction go for it IMO.
|
# ? Aug 31, 2023 23:21 |
|
spiritual bypass posted:shot down with "no, we just need a design we can have ready for market in 2 weeks." Containerized python + ecs + Redis + mongodb drat the performance or tech debt, and a couple of lambdas as bandaids
|
# ? Sep 1, 2023 02:09 |
|
Today was my last day at a job that moves around a shitload of data for some of the biggest entertainment brands on earth and the backend was Ruby on Rails, MySQL, Redis, and lambda bandaids. I was the entire tech department for the past year and it was mostly still running ok although definitely I was losing sleep over scale issues. I solved the problem though (by quitting)
|
# ? Sep 1, 2023 05:36 |
|
What is seed stage salary for a senior engineer in the bay area these days? Like $175-225 sounds about right?
|
# ? Sep 1, 2023 06:47 |
|
Achmed Jones posted:when the rubric is insufficient, you update it. One of the conundrums with rubrics is that sometimes a candidates' responses will want you to update the rubric, but or course if you do that then you could hardly call the rubric the fixed objective measure it's intended to be. I remember presenting a candidate with an impossible situation requiring various tradeoffs, and their first reaction was to ask if they could get help getting it done. I don't know what it says about us that none of the interviewers nor any of the past candidates had considered that answer.
|
# ? Sep 1, 2023 08:45 |
|
prom candy posted:I solved the problem though (by quitting) New thread title
|
# ? Sep 1, 2023 15:20 |
|
Hadlock posted:What is seed stage salary for a senior engineer in the bay area these days? Like $175-225 sounds about right?
|
# ? Sep 1, 2023 16:10 |
|
Can anyone recommend books or blogs on best practices for coming up with and documenting software architecture? Not necessarily design patterns or anything, more in the area of "here's a good format for the documentation" "Guidelines for how detailed is too detailed" "Here is what reviewers should be looking for". Something geared more towards large desktop Python applications would be great, but hopefully it would be fairly platform agnostic.
|
# ? Sep 3, 2023 14:44 |
|
That sounds a lot like an architectural decision record https://adr.github.io/
|
# ? Sep 3, 2023 14:58 |
|
spiritual bypass posted:That sounds a lot like an architectural decision record Seconded. ADRs are great.
|
# ? Sep 3, 2023 15:02 |
|
spiritual bypass posted:That sounds a lot like an architectural decision record This looks like just what I was asking for, thanks!
|
# ? Sep 3, 2023 16:12 |
|
jemand posted:I also am burned out and disengaged. I've been at my place for ~3 years, prior to that had a decade experience in a heavily quantitative academic field. Update on this: I've accepted a verbal offer of promotion to be peer to the manager I was describing above, & the overall structure will be adjusted so that at least a couple additional people would be moved over to my side. Talk is of our group inheriting a whole new IC team in the new year that would go to me, as well, so the team split at the moment is not 50/50. This promotion process has been incredibly insightful. It's been run as a full-posted new position structure, & the interview process has clarified quite a lot about what my current skip level (soon direct manager) really values (talk/actions differential, y'know.) Have a lot more understanding now how, while my manager absolutely was doing a pretty poor job in several ways, he was doing so in a complicated context that explains a lot more where he was coming from & why.
|
# ? Sep 5, 2023 22:49 |
|
An unexpected success story. I'm glad you made things work out for you.
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 03:13 |
|
BTW, my new direct manager will be an SVP, & my first ever managing experience started this Feb with 1 person & will be growing from there imminently. I'm fully aware our group would very greatly benefit from more actual layers and that I'll realistically be getting very limited amounts of coaching & feedback from my manager, but I also don't have high hopes for anything changing anytime soon with this structure. Does anyone have advice for how to operate in such a situation in the meantime? Currently, I'm planning on building a more wide network of contacts, coaches, & mentors from around the organization more generally that might help me out with any specific gaps in the direct channel. I have a start on that, but need to be a bit more deliberate to add some new perspectives. Other options are less clear to me & I would appreciate any ideas from this thread.
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 18:03 |
|
jemand posted:I'm fully aware our group would very greatly benefit from more actual layers and that I'll realistically be getting very limited amounts of coaching & feedback from my manager, but I also don't have high hopes for anything changing anytime soon with this structure. Does anyone have advice for how to operate in such a situation in the meantime? Currently, I'm planning on building a more wide network of contacts, coaches, & mentors from around the organization more generally that might help me out with any specific gaps in the direct channel. I have a start on that, but need to be a bit more deliberate to add some new perspectives. Other options are less clear to me & I would appreciate any ideas from this thread. Find a mentor and hire a leadership coach. My first leadership role was reporting to a VP and it sucked. No support and high expectations of what I could do independently which I wasn't in a position to match for obvious reasons.
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 18:31 |
|
Do you have clarity about what outcomes are expected?
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 20:38 |
|
wins32767 posted:hire a leadership coach. This strikes me as a fantastic idea that wasn't really on my radar. How do I find such a person? Any thread experiences here for what people generally look to get out of this? Thanks so much, btw, your perspective was exactly the sort of thing I wanted to hear. spiritual bypass posted:Do you have clarity about what outcomes are expected? No. Transmitting this sort of info was one of the things my (current, soon former) manager was absolutely horrendously bad at. SVP mostly relies on transmitting this info personally and having it pass second hand. He very much does NOT address the whole 100 ish person org on the direction he wants. He also thinks of himself as incredibly transparent on vision and direction, but I'm less sure about that myself. Might feel better after some time without a communication black hole in between us. jemand fucked around with this message at 20:47 on Sep 6, 2023 |
# ? Sep 6, 2023 20:39 |
|
If you post something on social media or LinkedIn about wanting to get in contact with one, they will generally come out of the woodworkjemand posted:. SVP mostly relies on transmitting this info personally and having it pass second hand. He very much does NOT address the whole 100 ish person org on the direction he wants. He also thinks of himself as incredibly transparent on vision and direction, but I'm less sure about that myself. A lot of SVP are hired (and stay employed) based on their ability to execute and add to the bottom line. Some SVP exist as leaders of people but it turns out a lot of the executive suite exists as jobs with unlimited potential as they have direct access to levers of power to make money appear. Having direct reports is often looked at as a chore secondary to their primary job which is making money If you report to an SVP you're effectively a director and expected to meet KPI but how is up to you. Good luck with that Hadlock fucked around with this message at 20:55 on Sep 6, 2023 |
# ? Sep 6, 2023 20:51 |
|
Hadlock posted:If you post something on social media or LinkedIn about wanting to get in contact with one, they will generally come out of the woodwork dont do this get a referral from someone you trust
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 20:53 |
|
Yeah go through a referral you trust. I guess I was just surprised at how big of an industry this is. My wife's boss has been hiring coaches for years (on the company's dime no less) and apparently going into business for herself as one now
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 21:02 |
|
Hadlock posted:Yeah go through a referral you trust. I guess I was just surprised at how big of an industry this is. My wife's boss has been hiring coaches for years (on the company's dime no less) and apparently going into business for herself as one now Leadership is a skill, or rather a complex set of skills, so unsurprisingly most people are pretty bad at it without training. ... I've been in leadership roles for over half my career now and I'm still just guessing a lot of the time.
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 21:19 |
|
|
# ? May 27, 2024 02:53 |
|
What does Oracle RTO situation look like, and are all their bay area engineering offices in Santa Clara or do they have a satellite engineering office in SF proper? I guess they're winding down their redwood city HQ building (formally in austin now) but I'm guessing that facility is mostly focused on management, sales, gov relations etc
|
# ? Sep 6, 2023 22:34 |