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0 pointsbbcbasic10y ago0 comments

Licensing should be up to the candidate, and it could be commercially licensed and not available to everybody.

You shouldn't have to write a OS Kernel or a modern browser in your spare time either. I'd say it would be about 4-8 hours work that shows off your skills.

But if you prefer to spend that same time on some inane made-up problem for one employer and code something that you will wont enjoy writing and never use again, then as I said in another reply that there should be the option for that too.

> Many other fields require competency tests

Is there a field that requires 4-8hr competency tests where each test is wildly different from the previous, with completely opaque criteria. At least with the provide your own project idea, if the employer has fucked up criteria the candidate has only wasted a few seconds of their time in sending the zip file.

Kind of analogous to 'show me your portfolio' for a photographer. The portfolio should be enough. Unfortunately this is not possible as a developer as the source from your previous jobs is likely to be closed, hence the need for a personal project.

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chc10y ago

> Licensing should be up to the candidate, and it could be commercially licensed and not available to everybody.

> You shouldn't have to write a OS Kernel or a modern browser in your spare time either. I'd say it would be about 4-8 hours work that shows off your skills.

Well, this is a different suggestion. Now we're only talking about a few hours of work rather than a pet project. I don't think the licensing makes much of a difference since I probably couldn't monetize four hours of randomly dorking around. I'm still not a huge fan of the idea, though, because it sounds hard to me to show off (adequately) skills I've spent decades acquiring with less than a day's worth of aimless work. I don't feel like it would be very impressive.

> Is there a field that requires 4-8hr competency tests where each test is wildly different from the previous, with completely opaque criteria.

Nobody is advocating for eight-hour tests. The OP said they expected their test to take less than half that. And most fields that require competency tests (e.g. cooking, acting, music) will expect you to do it live, on the spot. Take-home tests are being suggested in the case of programming specifically because programmers hate being expected to perform on the spot.

> At least with the provide your own project idea, if the employer has fucked up criteria the candidate has only wasted a few seconds of their time in sending the zip file.

Not all criteria that someone might test for are "fucked up." If I'm looking for, say, somebody to do a math-heavy machine learning job, and your pet open-source project is a jQuery plugin that makes web page backgrounds sparkly, the mismatch between those two is not the fault of my criteria.

bbcbasicOP10y ago

> because it sounds hard to me to show off (adequately) skills I've spent decades acquiring with less than a day's worth of aimless work

So you would be against a developer test too then?

> (e.g. cooking, acting, music) will expect you to do it live, on the spot.

Fair enough. So the developer equivalent should be a 1 hour technical interview, with perhaps a coding exercise on a computer within that hour. I am happy with those. To reduce the pressure the interviewer could leave the room for 10 mins while you code something. It is the do 4 hours work in your own time for a chance to get an interview or get to the next round that bugs me. And in reality I'd spend 8 just to maximize the chance of getting the job.

> your pet open-source project is a jQuery plugin that makes web page backgrounds sparkly

Yes there are sub divisions in the 'software developer' category. If you want a machine learning job you kind of have to demonstrate it one way or another. I argue that the option to show your existing code rather than do additional work on a made up problem is valuable.

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