Leetcode Is Impossible. Can I Still get a Software Job?

[@Icedanon]

How many other fields require a 4 year degree, and then have you learn everything you really need to know to get a job after graduation?

[@egm5081]

university does not teach how to code, thats why you dont need a degree, and you can start learning by your own

[@kappacmonbruh3393]

that is because software engineering != computer science. computer science is the science of computing with elements of applied math, pure maths and science and the language of medium is computer code. That is why you can be a darn good programmer from a non cs background while people who come from a cs background only use a little portion of what they learnt in school.

[@Adhanks91]

all of them i think lol. Double masters environmental science and public admin, hardly ever used anything i learned in school. Decided one day i'd had enough, and just focused on GIS/analyst jobs, havent looked back since. School is an absolute racket, and its not teaching job ready skills, this is a huge problem, especially given how much lit costs.

[@Icedanon]

@@kappacmonbruh3393 sadly schools don't offer swe degrees. If you want a software job, cs is the path. I think what we are both describing here is the disconnect between school and what the market demands. After all, the end goal of schooling for something like a 4 year degree is a job.

[@Romogi]

It depends. I wouldn't trust someone to work for us and do the math heavy software for us that didn't have some college level math courses.

[@gabrielkime6597]

Speaking to you struggling to solve fizzbuzz on your first interview, I really feel like one of the worst problems with technical interviews to assess skill is that if being interviewed is anxiety inducing for you that will dramatically reduce your critical thinking abilities. Its just not a good environment for assessing someone’s abilities under normal conditions. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if you would have been able to figure out fizzbuzz just fine if you hadn’t been so stressed out by being in your first interview.

[@CreatedByKC]

very true!

[@quavergamma4223]

I don’t comment on videos often, but KC you have no idea how much this video reassures me of my lack of leetcode practice. I’m a 4th year student in software engineering and I’ve felt so behind on all my other peers because I didn’t know how to solve even the simplest leetcode questions (and still somewhat do now). I’ve been doing a bit of leetcode here and there the past month or so with one of my friends also in software, but after struggling a whole lot, I kept telling myself that I should have started way earlier, that I was dumb for not knowing how to code two pointers even after 3 years of studying software. It reassures me that not everyone is comfortable with leetcode at first and that you showed your struggles with it too like procrastination and the fizzbuzz question (which pretty much the same thing happened to me when I was interviewing for my first internship). Honestly this is giving me the validation I much needed to keep pushing myself through the grind, because I do want to land a software job at a decently big company (so leetcode is inevitable), so thank you for putting it out. This is definitely a video I’m going to rewatch when I feel down.

[@jst8922]

Learn DSA (Data structures and algorithms).

[@lchig0]

You got this bruv

[@remains2246]

youre definitely behind the curve, you have to keep in mind that the industry when this guy was graduating was in a much better state than it is now

[@edboss36]

Most things that are bs won’t last. These leetcode problems won’t be used in the real job so don’t feel guilty for not doing them.

[@CreatedByKC]

Hey thank you for the support!! And I know its a tough journey, you're doing your best am I'm sure you'll be able to push through and land that software job you want :). I felt really behind when i was in college too, and it's completely normal. It's a slow and steady process. Keep going!!

[@craig.martin]

You are exactly the kind of engineer I'd want on my team. There's no flex BS, just good-natured self-awareness, talking to your experience, EQ off the charts, and yes, from your conversations, you do have the tech chops. I wish you continued success. Keep moving forward.

[@CreatedByKC]

thank you for the support!

[@lowwastehighmelanin]

I think being ok with just a middle of the road job and not desperately seeking FAANG can help. There's lots of great companies out there. If you're struggling that means it's hard and you're learning. Growth can be painful. How we talk to ourselves about it doesn't have to be unkind tho.

[@ManasicPlays]

Spot on. Leetcode is the barrier to entry. Yes I and many hate it, but at least they aren't testing our real skills haha. Also, don't let your hate for leetcode keep you out of the game, accept that it is just a part of the game.

[@liangyuaq-qoyunlu407]

leetcode are harder than real skill. I doubt anyone who is a high level leetcoder is not extremely skilled

[@edandersen]

Companies are not allowed to do IQ tests, so they do l33tcode instead. It is just an excuse to test your compliance (how willing are you to grind) and your general intelligence (puzzle solving).

[@denysivanov3364]

They can do whatever they want. Who said they can’t do IQ? Issue with IQ is also trainable. Those squares and circles are much less useful than data-structures and algorithms. For complex apps those algorithms are actually used!

[@ScreamGM963]

Learning leetcode for the first time and struggling just like you said in this video, hopefully it gets easier with practice

[@CreatedByKC]

You'll get it for sure!

[@albertohuerta]

Ugh I just bombed my OA for datadog. I needed to hear this video.

[@austinperrine23]

I really enjoyed this video man! I just got my first developer gig, and have made the commitment to "improve my craft", and I think just hearing about similar experiences and feelings is super helpful. This video brings good into the world.

[@CreatedByKC]

that's awesome congrats! And thank you!

[@AmarKrishna-c5h]

Dude you are doing just what you set out to do. "Making Software Engineers feel less alone!"

[@CreatedByKC]

Thank you!

[@novaploca2080]

I actually used all those concepts you said on the job. It was the only way to solve client problem. So yes to anyone reading this. If you know this hard problems will be given to you and you will progress faster than anyone else.

[@jst8922]

1:48 output numbers 1-100 multiples of 3: print fizz multiples of 5: print buzz for multiples of 3 and 5 : print fizzbuzz

[@jst8922]

for num in range(1, 101): if num % 3 == 0 and num % 5 == 0: print("FizzBuzz", end = " ") elif num % 3 == 0: print("Fizz", end = " ") elif num % 5 == 0: print("Buzz", end = " ") else: print(num , end = " ")

[@jst8922]

another way: output = [ "fizzbuzz" if number % 3 == 0 and number % 5 == 0 else "fizz" if number % 3 == 0 else "buzz" if number % 5 == 0 else str(number) for number in range(1, 101) ] print(" ".join(output) )

[@jst8922]

all this code is python 3

[@jst8922]

Got deja vu today: today my first chosen video was kzbin.info/www/bejne/oZWlq56uma9qmKs& and i saw under related suggestion on the right this one (6th video from the top down list) kzbin.info/www/bejne/Z6WUkJRnd79jatE 1:22 is mentioned the same problem :D

[@robertmazurowski5974]

I think Leet code is great if you don't have any experience because you are writing code and learning concepts. If you don't have a degree, this is a guaranteed method to get into the industry.

[@itsMohak]

Good advice like always. You are wondrous.

[@ayberk272]

I was worrying my ass off about my sufficiency to land a job during my a few months old self-taught journey into programming, this was a relief and reminded me to lean back and calmly study more lc and fundamentals ngl. Thank you for sharing the experience bro.

[@CreatedByKC]

Stay strong and keep going!

[@ildefonsocamargo8291]

sometimes it is not just coding, it is lack of math background. I think a CS program without a strong math component is to be avoided.

[@normadanirisdiandita1937]

at my job, everyday problems seem like harder version of leetcode..

[@guruware8612]

if they ask you to code a lined list, or do a search in a tree... ask them to try to arrive in the new millenium. when you get the job you will never do such things, they are coded already gazillion of times in all possible languages ready to use. same with algorithms. you need to know when to use them, not code them by yourself. if you want a job as a cook, you don't need to know how to grow vegetables. better try to do freelance work if possible, then you have more time for coding, not sitting most of the day in useless scrum/sprint/marketing/management-ego-polishing meetings.

[@dbgn]

Yeah that's real bad advice for any young person wanting to be programmer. It's not about the linked list or binary tree, it's about seeing how you approach a problem and whether you developed the muscle to solve problems. That's what software engineering is, solving one big problem on small chunks and doing this challenges build your muscle to do that.

[@Necr0e1]

what leetcode teaches you, is like talking through the problem rather than solving a specific problem

[@blackbriarmead1966]

Before watching - doing stuff like making video games, websites, apps, and web servers will give you a much better idea of practical skills required. Leetcode problems are designed to be puzzles basically, but for what it’s worth, the skills learned doing leetcode can help when designing algorithms in other domains. However, most of the time such algorithms are not used. Most of programming is moving and transforming data, and managing complexity/software engineering principles

[@blackbriarmead1966]

The job I’m starting, I will be working on a large state machine, and will be working with custom hypervisors and operating systems. It’s very different from my current experience which is in web, so I’m excited to get into this “hardcore” domain of the field

[@lchig0]

Lucky boi@@blackbriarmead1966

[@imlearninghelppls2544]

Interesting... I have recently started my studies in Software/Computer Engineering and I find most of the things I am studying fascinating. I have been working on very simple (but in my opinion fun) projects all in C, and I think that one of the hardest things is also organising the application, the whole "architecture" part of it seems to be crucial as well, because later in the same project, no matter how simple it is, you'll come across problems due to the way you designed functions, the data types you used and so on. Some time later I learned Java and got introduced to some OOP concepts (studied on my own, outside of uni), and my vision about structuring an application changed even more. I have also taken a look at data structures, and the kind of problem/challenged faced there is different, it is something way more "mathematical". They are essential because making poor decisions on what data structures we will use in the app as well as the algorithms that will operate on them might HUGELY affect the performance of the app. So maybe learning this is more about knowing when to choose certain data structures and algorithms for each problem you are going to solve is the most important thing, that is, if you are not aiming to really get into this part of CS. But I have not seen much about it (yet) so I can't really tell. So although I am still a baby in the world of Software Engineering and IT in general, it seems that everything is connected.. I am loving it.

[@codeyourpassion]

I liked the "hold the edge cases in your head". Functions should be relatively short and you should offload work to other functions if they do their own work, ESPECIALLY if that work might get repeated. This makes it easier to alter or update the process later on. Trying to go through authentication for example, you have to walk through the process, redirects, database hits, and you have to basically hold the current state in your head as you're reading/writing the next line. Ever wonder why some developers are so edgy, you just made them lose their place!

[@kausthubkrishnamurthy2410]

6 years into my career and I've never one done a leetcode interview... hell I'm not sure I've logged in since I did two for fun in undergrad. I've done other similar websites but they were such BS that I winged it. Basic understanding not leetcode DSA bs.

[@CheeseStickzZ]

Never been on leetcode. Senior software engineer. Leetcode can kiss my arse. If they ask me leetcode style questions I'll say: this is completely irrelevant to the job, ask me something that is applicable to your actual work environment.

[@Uppurak]

Helpful and motivating

[@ameerashhab6721]

I haven't done any Leetcode for 3 years. Purely just been building apps and UI designing fulltime, happy with my job. None of the jobs I interviewed did Leetcode BS with me. Rather React questions and just general web-based app building questions like Authentication etc...

[@matthewanderson6226]

I see a lot of people complaining about DSA interviews here, but it actually makes sense. To be a good software engineer takes 2 things: - a strong understanding of at least 1 coding language - the ability to effectively problem solve through research and analysis If you have those 2 qualities, you can pick up any software engineering job, in any field, in any tech stack/language. FAANG companies understand that if they can assure their new hires have those 2 skills, then they can learn everything they don’t know in the job. DSA questions happen affectively test both of those skills in a standardized way. Why test someone on domain knowledge and lose good candidates just because their experience is in a different field or tech stack?

[@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly]

Tell me what is a standard please. Leetcode interview are not standardized tests

[@matthewanderson6226]

@@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly the standard is DSA. Yes the questions are ever changing but the solutions always use the same fundamental skill set and knowledge. It’s standardized because you as the interviewee know for a fact that a DSA technical interview will feature questions that can be solved in any language using a knowledge of DSA. On the flip side, when businesses interview you on domain specific knowledge they could ask you anything. Applying for multiple jobs becomes really difficult because one job might test your GoLang knowledge, another might test your Scala knowledge. One might ask you Google Cloud specific questions and another AWS specific questions. You as a developer could only apply to jobs that use a tech stack you are familiar with, because it is unreasonable for you to learn all of them. There are endless variations of tech stacks. Where as DSA questions have defined algorithms to learn (Two Sum, binary search, Union-Find, etc) A developer that can solve DSA questions with ease is a developer who can pick up any tech stack, learn it, and role with it.

[@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly]

@@matthewanderson6226 sorry to let you down. I myself did dsa interviews and did clear a couple of them. But never ever I felt great on the interviews or came out of the ambiguity. But I have seen developers few of them being good in dsa didnt translate well on the job. Job requires very different skills. Infinite variations of dsa are possible That doesnt mean they can use a very hard puzzle to a senior engineer in an interview. Senior engineers are problem solvers not puzzle solvers. If you dont know to take an interview at the drop of an hat. Dont take it. Let someone who know can take it

[@matthewanderson6226]

@@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly A senior engineer is someone who can pick up any tech stack, learn it and role with it. Of course you’ve seen engineers who are good at DSA but bad at engineering. No system is perfect and people skate by. Maybe they memorized DSA solution and lucked out on the questions they were asked. However, DSA is typically a great metric of one’s ability to problem solve. Speaking as an engineer who has worked in multiple fields (Backend, Front End, Data Engineering) in multiple domains (Telecom, Finance) and multiple tech stacks (Java, Scala, Go, Python, etc.), my expertise lies in my ability to pivot into a new field with ease. Not in my current knowledge. Therefore I shouldn’t be expected to understand the tech stack of the company when I apply. Instead I should understand how to quickly adapt to it. DSA tends to be the best way to test this ability. But again, no test is perfect and there will always be outliers and complaints. Another major reason FAANG companies choose this approach is because their tech stacks are proprietary. They have to be. At their colosal size it would cost them millions if not billions of dollars to rely on non proprietary tech stacks. For example, Databricks is the number one cloud data computing company. However it still relies on AWS to house its infrastructure. Google isn’t going to rely on them for the data pipelines because 1. It means a competitor is storing their data (Amazon) and 2 they would require so many resources they would be bleeding money to Databricks. And since FAANG companies use proprietary tech stacks, they can’t test you on your knowledge of their tech stack.

[@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly]

Sorry cant agree with you man. DSA skills are not a match to real world skills. Perhaps the opposite

[@timtanhueco1990]

I still don’t understand why LeetCode is still being tagged as the Holy Grail of all things coding questions.

[@stagecodes]

You do not need any leetcode to land a job. I have 7 total completed leetcode questions. Interviewers value your real-world experience, and most companies do not even do live coding interviews. Your day-to-day is not more challenging than basic CRUD operations or fixing code smells for your first year at 99/100 companies. -2023 grad at a non-faang F500.

[@liangyuaq-qoyunlu407]

not in my experience. Even some small company with 7 people gave me 2 medium level leetcode questions.

[@stagecodes]

These are not the companies you want to be working for. They require new talent to be ready to work from day 1. Work for a large company who can afford to train you. @@liangyuaq-qoyunlu407

[@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly]

@@liangyuaq-qoyunlu407 that means you need to change the interviewer or company. Not grind leetcode. Use your time. Learn AI instead.

[@gordonramsdale]

Same here. Absolue piss take when some uknown company offers me terrible pay and gives me a leetcode mediums.@@liangyuaq-qoyunlu407

[@333jjjjjj]

Chicken Soup for the People Who Can't Code Good Soul

[@egm5081]

hey really nice video, thanks!

[@ThatOneBullet]

Ive been in the games industry as a software engineer for 8 years, and Ive never solved a leet code problem. So, imho who cares?

[@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly]

So true. I have heard even some fast trading companies are also doing away

[@stubb1qaz]

I have to disagree on “leet code teaches you to be comfortable in situations where you don’t immediately know the answer”. The entire point of leet code is the opposite: you practice to IMMEDIATELY know the answer to the problem during the interview. And let’s be honest, if you don’t know it you are not going to pass. Leet code problems are constructed in a way that makes sure you can’t solve them unless you know the answer or you solved something very similar before. There is no way to creatively solve a leet code problem during the interview and you will always lose that way to someone who simply knows the answer as they trained that problem.

[@monterreymxisfun3627]

Isn't a well-built Github portfolio more valuable than Leetcode? What about getting sharp at Kubernetes, Redis, Elastic stack, Airflow, etc.?

[@CreatedByKC]

Depends on the company and how they interview!

[@gordonramsdale]

Its good for GETTING an interview, but not passing

[@WhosShamouz]

All young coders must see this 🙏

[@eurowebs]

be a it engineer and work for a it company its the same like be a cheff and work for mc donalds, absolutely bullshit.

[@Icedanon]

It really is. I like the technical skills of the field. But had I known how toxic the industry was with bs like this, I would have never chosen this path.

[@eurowebs]

@@Icedanon it its the only market than when i engineer go for a interview they make you a exam, i never see nothing similar with other careers, doctor have to solve leetcode in the interviews, oh let go to do a problem, you have this broken arm please fix it , you have 30 minutes. this is so simple: if be a engineer is not a must for the job simply DO NO APPLY guys, is not a job for you. i need recruiters asholes that can difference beetween a doctor and a no doctor. Recruiter are the cancer of the it market, recruiters the most majority women that studied psicology with the hope of sane themselves of their mental disiases :) - have a nice day. chatgpt: Certainly, here's your text with corrected spelling and grammar: "It is the only market where, when I, as an engineer, go for an interview, they make you take an exam. I've never seen anything similar in other careers. Doctors have to solve LeetCode-like problems in their interviews. Oh, let's do a problem; you have this broken arm, please fix it, and you have 30 minutes. This is so simple: if being an engineer is not a requirement for the job, simply do not apply, guys. It's not a job for you. I need recruiters who can differentiate between a doctor and a non-doctor. Recruiters are the cancer of the IT market. Recruiters, the majority of whom are women that studied psychology with the hope of curing themselves of their mental illnesses. Have a nice day."

[@hellowill]

Lol my friend at Uni could do leetcode hard like it's nothing. I'm talking since compsci 101 he could do them. He got that Google job like it's nothing. Honestly most people working there never grinded leetcode, some never even heard of it. They just on another level.

[@andiuptown1711]

*Eh, probably got laid off*

[@TheMrVersetti]

I still don’t get how you overcame the gap from “can’t solve anything” to become “very cool” in leet code and how long does it take. I’m doing leet code about 2 weeks already, I did 50+ problems but problems usually with arrays, strings and maths, real algorithms such as binary trees, graphs, dynamic programming I don’t understand, I reading web sites watching videos about that but I don’t get them, I even barely doing two pointers and sliding windows because don’t understand. So I need to watch videos and read articles over and over again until I understand them ? Some days I read 2 hours an article and still don’t get it So how long does it take from you to master the leet code ?

[@z7sk]

50 problems is nothing. Most people getting FAANG offers are into a few hundred leetcode problems solved, if not 1000+. Though while some people overcome the leetcode barrier through quantity, it may be better to go for quality. Instead of focusing on blowing through as many problems as possible and then hoping you get one you've seen before during the interview, focus on getting good at basic data structures and algorithms (currently this means arrays, linked lists, heaps, queues, 2d arrays, graphs, and hash maps, and then binary search, DFS and BFS for algos). Look into neetcode or a similar course that introduces and explains these concepts rather than just focusing on the individual problems.

[@matthewanderson6226]

Stop reading about them and start implementing them. Pick an algorithm/problem, set a 15 min timer, attempt to implement/solve it. If you don’t succeed in 15 minutes, stop and lookup the solution. Compare the solution to your implementation. See what you did wrong and what you forgot. Then do the same thing tomorrow. Use Spaced repetition software like Anki to space out your practice in increasing intervals. You’ll get there, you just need to do get your feet wet. Learning is 80% doing 20% watching.

[@TheMrVersetti]

@@matthewanderson6226 but how I can implement them, if I don’t get them?? I reed or watch and don’t understand consequence, of course I will not solve anything under 15 minutes because I did not get concepts

[@not_ever]

@@TheMrVersettiif you don’t understand the solution you may benefit from stepping through the solution in a debugger or writing the code out on paper and going through it step by step by hand. You will find it clicks after a while. Don’t be discouraged and good luck

[@matthewanderson6226]

@@TheMrVersetti you need to teach your self how to problem solve. And you need to learn to be okay with failure and uncomfortable situations. Attempting to solve something you don’t understand will be uncomfortable, but I guarantee you will intuitively come to some form of a solution. It may not be working code but every failed attempt will bring a better understanding when you compare to the correct solution. Trust me here, you need to hone your intuition and deductive reasoning

[@el_carbonara]

also the leetcode UI and similar platforms are complete dog shit that adds to the frustration. Plus the wording of the questions aren't even correct most of the time just to trick you it seems. life sucks

[@alexandrerolim5983]

this is my history...

[@nielsfrederiksen6636]

Honest question: Cant AI solve most leet code problems fairly easily? Do you think this means the challenges will get substantially harder or will the field move on to other tools for gatekeeping?

[@CreatedByKC]

Its very hard to say for certain, but yeah AI can solve a lot of these questions now. I can't really see companies moving away from leetcode anytime soon just because they don't seem to have a much better way of assessing candidates unfortunately

[@alpaca_growing_kit]

Leetcode is becoming completely irrelevant with AI... mark my words. Soon, the only thing relevant in software engineering is design patterns, system design and so on... like architecture stuff and choosing certain technologies over others. The actual algorithms themselves, unless extremely complicated, will not be made by humans at all.

[@zzzzzzzjsjyue2175]

Most leetcode algorithms are not in job as it is anyways. It’s not going away

[@alpaca_growing_kit]

@@zzzzzzzjsjyue2175 I'm talking you barely have to know a programming language to be a software engineer. GPT4 is basically on a retarded stage right now compared to how it's going to perform in just a couple years.

[@zzzzzzzjsjyue2175]

@@alpaca_growing_kit that’s all speculation. Everyone I met uses right now only for templating and avoiding documentation pretty much

[@alpaca_growing_kit]

@@zzzzzzzjsjyue2175 Just wait

[@angyeet5392]

well they will still have humans writing code so you should know dsa. No one knows how long it will take for chat gpt to actually be useful enough. Plus, it slows down and crashes after like 100+ messages

[@balajiMurugesan-sv2ly]

If you want to get good in driving a car. You should actually drive one. You should not go deep into understanding how engine works or grasping the concepts of every car part It makes no sense. Though it might help you to understand how to drive it a bit efficient, you wont be using the knowledge in day to day driving. Leetcode is similar to that. some questions make sense, most problems asked in the big tech makes no sense.

[@AndiPlays]

driving is way easier

[@Rockyzach88]

Lol only 3 hours?

[@vitalyl1327]

Leetcode questions are not around some "niche" knowledge (fundamental - yes, but if you're trying to write code without any fundamental knowledge, it's a you problem). Real world work requires constructing algorithms. Yet, real world problems are usually large and convoluted, while leetcode problems are small and easy to explain in a single paragraph. So how else will you test an ability to construct algorithms, if not on small and simple problems? Anyone who fail with those will fail with the real-world problems spectacularly. On the other hand, any real-world related question would have been unavoidably niche.

[@IndraX77]

It's widely known that leetcode performance has no relation to one's ability to do daily software engineering work.

[@vitalyl1327]

@@IndraX77 it is "widely known" among bitter bootcamp "graduates" who got a dose of reality check on technical interviews? Because there is no credible data whatsoever to back your point. And, no, leetcode performance does not determine the quality of engineering work - it's just the bare minimum. There are other ways to assess the quality, after it's proven that the applicant is minimally competent and can actually construct trivial algorithms.

[@IndraX77]

Ok? There is no credible data that says leetcode produces quality engineers either. So what? Also yeah man I think it's important to give seniors leetcode questions to make sure they're minimally competent! Also, companies do not just ask for trivial algorithms.

[@uGetkilled]

I think it's important to factor in the origin of these Leetcode-style questions. FAANG companies that get 300 applications, but can only have 2 people for a specific role, will use Leetcode-style questions as 'weeding out' candidates who haven't put in the work. For companies that deal with these kind of mass-scale hiring strategies, I would argue it makes sense. Lots of people want in, you want to weed out 'the worst' and focus on 'the best'. But for 99% of other tech companies, using LC as a hiring process is total bullshit. Tell me how it's useful to return the longest palindrome substring, when the day-to-day job is literally building CRUD APIs or doing DevOps work? Also, like @IndraX77 mentioned, there is no research that suggests that engineers who pass LC are a *better* fit for the job. Because someone came up with a clever 'palindrome' solution, does that make them a good engineer? Or did they simply memorize the LC problem because they've seen it before. Or more recently: Who says the applicant didn't use GPT4 to solve the problem? The problem I have with LC questions is that it's trying to quantify someone's knowledge based on a completely different problem set. "Oh you have 7 years of experience writing APIs in Spring Boot? Please prove it by solving this palindrome problem". Yeah, that seems totally relevant. LC is just a half-assed non-personalized gate-keeping test which in no way at all assesses a candidate's fit for a job.

[@vitalyl1327]

@@IndraX77 there is credible evidence that shows that engineers who cannot construct even the simplest algorithms in ideal conditions are worthless. And you'd be surprised how many "senior engineers" with long careers and immaculate CVs cannot actually code, at all.

[@lenalyman9526]

Does Leetcode sponsor you?

[@hdjksa52]

Hmmm.....Leetcode.

[@orlovskyconsulting]

Dont do leetcode!

[@reyreyalldayday5708]

Ha this was exactly me 2 years ago

[@lchig0]

GOAT

[@CrashOverride332]

"LeetCode is a skillset entirely on its own". Yes, and it's such a useless one, as you said. But hopefully that goes by the wayside as ChatGPT destroys these interviews and the tower of nonsensical assumptions they were built on.

[@dbgn]

It's not useless, it teach you to tackle hard problems on small parts and solve them. This is what software engineers do basically every day, yes it's useless if you want to be DevOps engineer, but if you want to write code, you gotta do at least the minimum of it. I am not saying solve LeetCode problems for 2 years straight only, of course that's not practical. It's more important to do some reallife full stack project with frontend, backend, database, upload to cloud etc. But don't skip tottaly algorithmic challenges. They are building the brain muscle for coding.

[@CrashOverride332]

@@dbgn I've worked in industry before, and no, those problems are nothing like what software developers do every day.

[@dbgn]

@@CrashOverride332 Well I still work in industry and that's what I am doing every day. And I can say the difference between average engineer and brilliant one is exactly this, how much he had developed his muscle to tackle hard problems and solve problems, which algorithmic questions really do. It is like training for your brain, that's it.

[@CrashOverride332]

@@dbgn if they have you doing code puzzles on the job, they're a bad company

[@not_ever]

⁠​⁠​⁠​⁠​⁠​⁠@@CrashOverride332”if they have you doing coding puzzles on the job” That is not what this person said to you, they said leet code teaches algorithmic problem solving skills and those skills are needed in their current workplace.