Interesting how negative your reaction is. Also how far off target all that anger is.

I am not selecting for a tribe, I am selecting for a job. The questions are loaded, of course. Among the many duties, the jobs do require processing large files, sometimes with cut, Python or C. I want the candidate to use the most appropriate tool as needed. I'd rather not have people implement functionality that already exists in the 'comm' command.

Of course, I want the candidate to ask me what the column separator is. That's why the question is formulated that way.

The right answer will depend on the column separator. Proposing the UNIX cut if the file is CSV is not such a good answer, but for tab-separated files, it is just fine. If the file is CSV and they tell me about cut, my next question would be if that is a good universal solution for CSV files in general.

When someone that knows about the pitfalls of using cut when parsing CSV it shows me they have indeed had experience with that.

Do you see why this question is the best... the possibilities are endless, and the rabbit hole much deeper than it may seem

He didn't ask to use cut, you could use whatever windows function you have used as well. Unless, of course, you've never have had to unmangle a weird text file to get something out of it in your computing history. Then perhaps I don't want you at all?

OP asked a very open ended question, merely made a suggestion that it could also be done with some standard Unix programs (I grew up on windows and even I know about cut and awk because you spend enough time anywhere in tech you will know these). Why it triggered you, not sure, but perhaps the question it's doing its job after all.

> Pretend all you want, but you're filtering not by "experience" but by trying to find people in your tribe, which is naturally heavily weighted in chauvinism, racism and elitism.

I didn't realize Linux Users counted as a race now :D

`cut`, `sort`, and `head` are basic Unix commands. Even in a Windows world, they're easily available (either running Ubuntu terminal or cygwin).

This is like complaining that you can't read the basics of a new programming language.