i continue to question the "whiteboard coding" experience.
on one hand: a dev cannot put their thoughts about a problem set into code on a white board.
on the other hand: a dev answers all problems with code on a white board.
i find it hard to believe that taking a dev away from their desk and providing a whiteboard with marker is so different that it would make one become a "bad developer" incapable of solving a problem.
i find it easy to believe that the dev has just not practiced coding on a whiteboard. therefore, when asked to do so, cannot bc of to anxiety from not practicing.
if one can write english on a whiteboard and not get anxious, then why would a professional developer get anxious about writing c++ or java on a whiteboard?
like i said, i go back and forth on this when it comes to interviewing people.
I've been a developer now for a year and a half, and right now, I don't think I would have any anxiety about writing code on a whiteboard (even if the final outcome would be no code - I can't know everything!) or even over the phone. However, when I interviewed for the present job, I was straight out of college, and even with 10+ years experience being a hobby programmer, I was very very nervous. So, I would say coding questions are OK, except maybe for junior, inexperienced applicants.
If a candidate is nervous, the interviewer should relax him. Start with a really really easy question. The interviewer should adapt to the candidate.
But a candidate is going to have to bend himself somewhat towards a company. If hired, adopt their coding standards, source control, and bug reporting systems, at least. A candidate who refuses to bend at all during the interview process is a big danger sign.
Asking someone to code for a non-coding position is dumb. Asking someone to code on a piece of paper is not. The interviewer should be forgiving of silly syntax mistakes, of course. If you can't remember the order of arguments to strstr(), that's okay. If you don't know strstr() exists, that's a problem.
on one hand: a dev cannot put their thoughts about a problem set into code on a white board.
on the other hand: a dev answers all problems with code on a white board.
i find it hard to believe that taking a dev away from their desk and providing a whiteboard with marker is so different that it would make one become a "bad developer" incapable of solving a problem.
i find it easy to believe that the dev has just not practiced coding on a whiteboard. therefore, when asked to do so, cannot bc of to anxiety from not practicing.
if one can write english on a whiteboard and not get anxious, then why would a professional developer get anxious about writing c++ or java on a whiteboard?
like i said, i go back and forth on this when it comes to interviewing people.