[TUHS] Interview question

[TUHS] Interview question

[Larry McVoy]

The /bin/sh stuff made me think of an interview question I had for engineers,
that a surprisingly few could pass:

"Tell me about something you wrote that was entirely you, the docs, the
tests, the source, the installer, everything.  It doesn't have to be a
big thing, but it has to have been successfully used by at least 10
people who had no contact with you (other than to say thanks)."

Most people fail this.  I think the people who pass might look 
positively on the v7 sh stuff.  But who knows?

[TUHS] Re: Interview question

[arnold]

Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:

> The /bin/sh stuff made me think of an interview question I had for engineers,
> that a surprisingly few could pass:
>
> "Tell me about something you wrote that was entirely you, the docs, the
> tests, the source, the installer, everything.  It doesn't have to be a
> big thing, but it has to have been successfully used by at least 10
> people who had no contact with you (other than to say thanks)."
>
> Most people fail this.  I think the people who pass might look 
> positively on the v7 sh stuff.  But who knows?

How many people who failed this question did you hire anyway?

[TUHS] Re: Interview question

[Larry McVoy]

On Mon, Jan 02, 2023 at 01:38:30PM -0700, arnold@skeeve.com wrote:
> Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> > The /bin/sh stuff made me think of an interview question I had for engineers,
> > that a surprisingly few could pass:
> >
> > "Tell me about something you wrote that was entirely you, the docs, the
> > tests, the source, the installer, everything.  It doesn't have to be a
> > big thing, but it has to have been successfully used by at least 10
> > people who had no contact with you (other than to say thanks)."
> >
> > Most people fail this.  I think the people who pass might look 
> > positively on the v7 sh stuff.  But who knows?
> 
> How many people who failed this question did you hire anyway?

None that I kept.  Miss-hired some who didn't pass and let them go eventually.
Whether that question actually is that good of an indicator in general, I
couldn't say.  It was a pretty solid one for what we did.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy           Retired to fishing          http://www.mcvoy.com/lm/boat

[TUHS] Re: Interview question

[Ori Idan]

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Nice question, but I don't see the connection.

-- 
Ori Idan CEO Helicon Books
http://www.heliconbooks.com





On Mon, Jan 2, 2023 at 10:37 PM Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:

> The /bin/sh stuff made me think of an interview question I had for
> engineers,
> that a surprisingly few could pass:
>
> "Tell me about something you wrote that was entirely you, the docs, the
> tests, the source, the installer, everything.  It doesn't have to be a
> big thing, but it has to have been successfully used by at least 10
> people who had no contact with you (other than to say thanks)."
>
> Most people fail this.  I think the people who pass might look
> positively on the v7 sh stuff.  But who knows?
>

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[TUHS] Re: Interview question

[Rich Morin]

Sadly, I can't remember whose USENIX talk it was, but I recall a software maturity scale that went something like this:

1 - it works in your office
2 - it works in an office down the hall
3 - it works for someone you've never met
4 - you don't have to explain why you use it
5 - you have to explain why you don't use it

-r

> On Jan 2, 2023, at 12:36, Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> The /bin/sh stuff made me think of an interview question I had for engineers,
> that a surprisingly few could pass:
> 
> "Tell me about something you wrote that was entirely you, the docs, the
> tests, the source, the installer, everything.  It doesn't have to be a
> big thing, but it has to have been successfully used by at least 10
> people who had no contact with you (other than to say thanks)."
> 
> Most people fail this.  I think the people who pass might look 
> positively on the v7 sh stuff.  But who knows?

[TUHS] Re: Interview question

[Ajay Shah]

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On Tue, 3 Jan 2023 at 10:46, Rich Morin <rdm@cfcl.com> wrote:

> Sadly, I can't remember whose USENIX talk it was, but I recall a software
> maturity scale that went something like this:
> 1 - it works in your office
> 2 - it works in an office down the hall
> 3 - it works for someone you've never met
> 4 - you don't have to explain why you use it
> 5 - you have to explain why you don't use it
>

Perhaps we can introduce a #6 here:

A successful software tool is one that was used to do something undreamed
of by it's author.

  -- S. C. Johnson

-- 
Ajay Shah
ajayshah@mayin.org
http://www.mayin.org/ajayshah

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