Slashdot Mirror
Will the Solve-the-Riddle Hiring Trend Affect IT?
An anonymous reader wonders: "It's probably harder to find a good developer, than for a developer to find a job. Seems to be a Google-riddle trend; rather than caring about references/diplomas/resumes, employers are using solve-this-and-you-have-a-job approach, not even caring about any usual information. Does that give decent graduates/talented unexperienced devs/homegrown coders a chance at the corporate job, or does it alienate potential matches?"
Hmm. Websense blocks proveyourworth.net because it falls in the 'sex' category. Now I'm really curious about what this riddle is...
This guy's the limit!
For those of you confused by the gibberish above, you can solve it by using the key in the subject line. The process involves adding and subtracting each subsequent character value in the key. Since 'm' is the 13th character, you start by adding 13. From there you subtract 15 ('o' is the 15th character), and then you add 15 again. This gives you a final rotation value of 13. You can then apply that to the message to decrypt it.
This guy's the limit!
Manager
"The bad news is that you failed the puzzle exam, the good news is that if you can make this power point slide animate annoyingly while playing music, you're hired."
CEO/CFO/etc.
"Here's a knife and here's your mother, stab her and I'll give you $20."
Corporate Lawyer
"Look outside and tell me it's raining (it's sunny). Now write the most incomprehensible sentence you can. When you are finished, Bob the CEO wants to talk to you about another test."
Accountant
"See these two piles of cash on my table? When I turn around, you have five seconds to hide one so that I can't find it."
Marketing
"Tell me again how this pen in my hand can cure cancer?"
Sales
"I have several baggies of what appears to be baking soda on my desk, when I come back at lunch, they should be gone."
Intern
"When I say it's all your fault, you say ok. It's your fault."
Technical Support
"This button on the phone transfers the caller to another support person. Can you press it?"
Office Assistant
"Do you have experience with the mentally handicapped or young children? Meet Bob, your new boss."
1. Sales has agreed to build a system, and the client's already signed off on a fixed price payment. You have 1 month to build it until the budget runs out. There is no spec, no design document, and no way to confirm any given feature. What do you do?
A. Build as fast as possible and hope for the best.
B. Cry and whimper like a baby, because you're completely screwed.
C. Pitch a fit to management/slashdot/etc about what sales did.
D. Burn the place down.
E. All of the above.
stuff |
More often than not, crashes the machine.
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
'we need an entire application written this week, don't worry about design or figuring out what the application really needs to do, just write something.'
Wow, I used to work there too! Did you know Fred?
[Insert pithy quote here]
The next level to advance to was a test. The test was to implement a small web server (GET/HEAD commands basically) in C++ using *no external libraries of any kind*.
So you had to GET/HEAD over a weekend? Was your wife allowed to help you?
Fred... Fred... He wrote that big thing with no documentation, right? Man, do you have his contact info?
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
If it takes you 2-3 hours to GET/HEAD, you're cruising the wrong street corners! ;)
Ed R.Zahurak
You know, oblivion keeps looking better every day.
Does it have to be a network web server? Maybe you just run the executable and it prints an HTML string if the first arg is GET.
Or maybe you use ASCII art in the source code to draw a picture of a waiter serving some HTML code on a platter.
The global economy is a great thing until you feel it locally.
"How many lights do you see?"