FWIW, every data structure / algo interview I've done allowed me to use built in functions for sorting (I work at FAANG).
In general, I dislike the interview process too, but there just isn't a better way to do these, as is clear from this large thread. If you look at it from the company's perspective, you have to conduct interviews at scale, and it can't hand off the same system problem to everyone.
You're being tested on your problem solving ability. It doesn't correlate directly to your job, but the general assumption is, if you can solve puzzles after studying for them, the chance that you can solve any random problem thrown at you is high.
I work at FAANG - my take is, all questions can be solved based on these 10-15 data structures / algorithms. They are just gift wrapped with a lot of fluff, but underlying each of them is one or a combination of one of these data structures / algos.
As an aside, to everyone who has asked me how to get into FAANG - I always say you should be able to code DFS/BFS in your sleep like your life depends on it. 1/5 questions is surely going to be a tree/graph search.
The OP probably means once a company is already established and has their core product peaked at max profit, they struggle to innovate further and build new products. Working at FAANG; I can see the desperation my org has in trying to build the next generation to remain relevant.
Apart from pulling the plug on products at random, why I'm sceptical is because this hasn't been introduced / used internally widely.
Think of it like a product Google created, say Cloud, but doesn't use it itself. Oh wait. It doesn't.
Yes, but:
- They're trying to do the same thing by keeping you engaged by shoving up as much content as they can to you, by making recommender systems that "know you".
- They polarize you in just the same way as advertisements do. Once I started watching documentaries on meat, that's all I was suggested further. The only thing I'd say is Netflix's content is regulated and less opinionated, whereas YouTube is a free market and every opinion has its own library of rabbit holes to dig into.
What really resonated with me is one of the speakers talking about taxing companies on collecting users' data.
They first establish that the sole driving factor for these companies is making more money than the previous quarter.
Now, if companies had to pay financially for all the data they store, they wouldn't have as strong an incentive to collect every possible data point that they can.
Something that really annoys me is a blob of code suddenly pushed to GitHub without a commit message, and then 10 random Update Readme commits. The repository holds no history.
A rich git history a lot of the times imo is necessary to understand why some parts are written the way they are written, and is also enjoyable to read.