> Algos/data structures are used as a proxy for problem solving and how fast someone can learn.
A piss poor one if you ask me. The truth is that it’s a skill where you need to internalize what various low level data structures buy you to know when to reach for them.
Most of the code I saw at Google was boring ass proto transforms based on business logic. Knowing when to use a map vs an array was about as complex as it got for 95% of the positions.
Additionally, knowing the algorithms/ds (as all Googlers are supposed to) did not help for that normal work. A bunch of folks I worked with in the open source world produced better structured, better tested, and more performant code than many of the internal folks but they couldn’t join Google because of the algo/ds bar.
A piss poor one if you ask me. The truth is that it’s a skill where you need to internalize what various low level data structures buy you to know when to reach for them.
Most of the code I saw at Google was boring ass proto transforms based on business logic. Knowing when to use a map vs an array was about as complex as it got for 95% of the positions.
Additionally, knowing the algorithms/ds (as all Googlers are supposed to) did not help for that normal work. A bunch of folks I worked with in the open source world produced better structured, better tested, and more performant code than many of the internal folks but they couldn’t join Google because of the algo/ds bar.