leetcode5ucks10

Assuming you're from India and know well about the job market here,

My comment tries to highlight a very specific issue that using progressively harder leetcode problems selects for people who do leetcode all day, and me trying to focus on CS fundamentals and actual programming was a mistake.

It has nothing to do with me wanting to work in FAANGM or not, or any of the philosophy you wrote.

You wrote that FANGM salaried person will be miserable. You know who will be more miserable? The software engineer who had to settle for a less paying company or startup. The engineer who came from a humble rural background and wanted to leave a mark on the world, but lost to the measure-oriented competition which rewards the cargo cult mentality.

Looking around me, the cargo cult leetcoding kids are more happier, that's probably because they are already from a better background than I am. Doesn't change the fact that if I grinded what it required to game the job market, I would've been at a place better than them.

Doesn't matter you are one of the most gifted athlete, if you're playing the game that doesn't have any prizes.

Doesn't matter.

When I joined CS degree I also thought like you did.

Now looking at insane competition, the kids who can't write a real program if their life depends upon it, constantly getting better internship and job offers than me, I believe I was wrong.

No one cares.

People who interview are also likely Leetcode kids. So they will ask some obscure question from 14th page of Leetcode to flex, so the probability of passing is almost proportional to amount of time you grind.

If I have a chance to go back to year 1, I focus on Leetcode. Fundamentals be damned.

In this industry no one has an incentive to care about efficiency. If they did, we wouldn't be gambling with right candidate answering an obscuring question from some 10+ page of Leetcode or Hackerrank.

Now someone from outside India can reply to this with their usual justifications. To be clear, I don't hate DSA questions. Just pointing out as your leetcodes get harder, you tend to select people who do leetcode whole day than those who are good at DSA and also good at programming.

Edit: and yes, "if you're good at DSA you should be able to answer the obscure question". Dude obscure question will be LC hard or upper end of medium. The kid who does Leetcode 3 hours a day already seen the question and remembers the answer too, and there are n > 10 kids like that.