Indeed. For the record, I let people take however much time they need, if they get stuck I ask them to discuss their approach, etc. I'm not looking for the solution (as parent said, it is a solved problem), I'm looking for evidence of problem solving skills. And you can demonstrate them, even for this question, without actually being able to write down a working solution. (I don't want to go into everything here, but one of the things I look for is people who consider the case of an empty list - critically thinking about special cases is an important trait)
That said, work environment often has some kind of time constraint. If one can't solve any of the (simple, abstract, representative) problems that I pose within a 2hour time frame, it is possible that they are not a good match. And unfortunately, I rarely have the leisure to hire someone for a month to prove otherwise.
[from a comment of yours below]
> You're right about that particular exercise. I kind of used it to make a more general point.
That may be true for others, but my interview questions are all of this mold: abstract, with a short and simple (but not trick-required-here) solution, close to (an abstract version of) a real world "business problem".
I agree that technical interview questions (much like many aspects of life) put the wrong kind of stress on some and puts them at a disadvantage. But, and I always ask this[0], what alternative do you suggest?
[0] The answers so far have been essentially either "no idea", "let me prove to you on my terms" (which, when broken down, is rarely economical for either side or at all possible), or "just trust me on this"; I find none of them satisfying.
Then I'd say you have some pretty decent justifications for your approach. I'd take the negative responses you got as constructive rather than inflammatory: if it made you review your justifications and think again about whether approach is fair, then they did their job.
In many ways, writing on the Internet is much like the interviews we are discussing, especially in a place such as this, which has so many highly opinionated experts. I get why you got hostile responses to your post, but I also get what the reason for writing that post was. In person, the exact same words would not have lead to such a high-strung feeling as one gets when posting about anything controversial on the Internet.
On the Internet, if you go out on a limb, someone will always cut the branch.
That said, work environment often has some kind of time constraint. If one can't solve any of the (simple, abstract, representative) problems that I pose within a 2hour time frame, it is possible that they are not a good match. And unfortunately, I rarely have the leisure to hire someone for a month to prove otherwise.
[from a comment of yours below]
> You're right about that particular exercise. I kind of used it to make a more general point.
That may be true for others, but my interview questions are all of this mold: abstract, with a short and simple (but not trick-required-here) solution, close to (an abstract version of) a real world "business problem".
I agree that technical interview questions (much like many aspects of life) put the wrong kind of stress on some and puts them at a disadvantage. But, and I always ask this[0], what alternative do you suggest?
[0] The answers so far have been essentially either "no idea", "let me prove to you on my terms" (which, when broken down, is rarely economical for either side or at all possible), or "just trust me on this"; I find none of them satisfying.