> I prefer to talk them through the problem together, like we were actual teammates working on a problem together.
If a colleague came to me to discuss a question this basic, I'd want them PIPed out. This is miles from the complexity of problems that require collaboration. It's a shell pipeline that I'd write with sort/uniq in less than five minutes. I just did it to make sure my estimate wasn't wrong:
Maintainable? No. Done iteratively in less than five minutes? Yes.
If your perspective is that it's unrealistic to ask anyone to come up with an answer to this question on the spot, you should take a long, hard look at yourself and the quality of your colleagues.
As mentioned over and over. This isn't about the ability to do it. This is about making it less of a hazing ritual that generally only seeks to make the interviewer have a sense of importance.
If a colleague came to me to discuss a question this basic, I'd want them PIPed out. This is miles from the complexity of problems that require collaboration. It's a shell pipeline that I'd write with sort/uniq in less than five minutes. I just did it to make sure my estimate wasn't wrong:
Maintainable? No. Done iteratively in less than five minutes? Yes.If your perspective is that it's unrealistic to ask anyone to come up with an answer to this question on the spot, you should take a long, hard look at yourself and the quality of your colleagues.