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A comment on Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become a Google engineer. Parent comment

Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by mattnewton on Thursday October 06, 2016 @11:12AM (#12653147)
Who writes those premade robust libraries? Who improves them, when a few percentages of improvement will be multiplied by enough machines to come out to millions of dollars saved?

If you have a pile of raw iron and you're currently running your own smelt for cost savings over the other remodelers, maybe even though you are in the remodeling business you could use those skills.

I agree though that contracting is by far the best way to grade performance. But the Google style interview is the only reasonable alternative I know of to filter out people who don't actually know the technologies they are talking about and can fake it with other people's code for months.

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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by fail2fail2ban on Thursday October 06, 2016 @11:53AM (#12653466)
He's saying every company needs a Sheldon or two; they don't need a company full of Sheldons.
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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by mattnewton on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:06PM (#12653591)
Sure, but a library writer can use libraries; the converse is often not true. And most places pride themselves on a) hiring really good people and b) giving them mobility within the company. If I wanted someone to glue stuff together without contributing to company infrastructure why not just hire a contractor for the gig?

(Also Off topic, but should I know who Sheldon is?)

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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by inanutshellus on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:22PM (#12653729)
Character from the tv show Big Bang Theory. The character is highly intelligent but quirky.

http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/the-big-bang-theory/images/26450...

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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by pjlegato on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:18PM (#12653696)
The point is the test doesn't select for "ability to contribute to company infrastructure" at all. It selects for "mathematical knowledge of theoretical computer science." These are related skillsets, but largely uncorrelated.
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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by mmmpop on Thursday October 06, 2016 @01:27PM (#12654304)
A company full of Sheldons? Come on man, it's just us.
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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by cc81 on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:25PM (#12653748)
Character in the tv-show The Big Bang Theory. Portrayed as highly intelligent but annoying.
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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by blub on Thursday October 06, 2016 @11:31AM (#12653297)
Re libraries: the library team I would assume and hope, since this is a very specialised skill.
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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by jasode on Thursday October 06, 2016 @12:30PM (#12653787)
>the library team I would assume and hope,

I've never been at a company that had a dedicated "library team". The common code and functions that go into the libraries are artifacts of programming the other stuff that needs it. It's not a job title.

(Unless the company's product to sell is a compiler. In that case, it would follow Conway's Law and you'd have a set of programmer's implementing the standard library. I don't see how that division of responsibilities applies to Google or other companies.)

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Re:Google Interview University – Plan for studying to become... by Ar-Curunir on Thursday October 06, 2016 @03:58PM (#12655573)
Pretty sure Google has multiple such teams dedicating to writing performance code that can be reused.
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