I remember when I first applied for a job in a fabrication/machine shop. One of the questions in the interview was “Do you know how to read a tape measure‽” followed by “demonstrate that you can use a tape measure” along with some other fun ones like “what is the difference between these two pieces of material” (one was aluminum, the other stainless) and other such things. I remember being surprised/disappointed that there were grown people who couldn’t read a tape measure.
I’ve worked in machine shops and drafting offices for years now, and I’m no longer surprised by people who can’t use basic measuring tools. Still disappointed though.
There’s a great test for programmers called FizzBuzz. It’s an extremely easy task - print some numbers (maybe 1 to 100), but replace them with Fizz if they’re divisible by 3, by Buzz if they’re divisible by 5, or by FizzBuzz if they’re both.
Many reasonable people consider it way too easy - if you can write this, it doesn’t mean that you can write complex programs, or that you know the applicable languages, or that you know anything about the business domain.
But interviewers know that it’s a great test because a lot of so-called programmers still fail it.
We did a fizzbuzz interview with a candidate. He passed but I had a weird feeling about it so we asked him to do another one with 7 and 21 and he couldn’t do it even with his old code right there
Damn, dude managed to literally memorize code without having any idea of what was going on. Meanwhile, I’d spend most of my time trying to figure whether it’s div or mod that i’m supposed to use to check for the remainder of a division, I always forget which is which
It’s good for a young dev IMO because that problem has many solutions and shows the programming style of the dev as well. But I agree that having a problem that is related to the actual work is better.
OK - now I’m curious, what were the most common mistakes people made reading a tape measurer? Because I’m having trouble working out how someone could screw that up lol
We had a guy we called “10/16” (ten sixteenths) because he was told to grab some 5/8" (0.625" or 16mm) steel plate, but he couldn’t find any he could only find 10/16" and 12/16".
People will count the little lines on the tape and not remember if they are 1/32, 1/16, or 1/8.
I worked with a girl who would say “4 and 3 ticks!” meaning 1/8ths. We laughed at her enough that she tried to improve and started saying “4 point 3!” that lead to a discussion about decimal inches. I really blew her mind when I showed her the scale in 12ths on carpenter squares.
After having a customer chew us out for something that wasn’t our fault he had us follow him to another room to discuss some more work. He borrows my tape measure and tries to measure something on the wall and the tape keeps falling over and flexing. It finally hits him in the face and hands it back to me and says “I’m not familiar with this type of tool”. I think he saw our faces turn red and eyes water up as we were trying SOOO hard not to laugh.
I remember when I first applied for a job in a fabrication/machine shop. One of the questions in the interview was “Do you know how to read a tape measure‽” followed by “demonstrate that you can use a tape measure” along with some other fun ones like “what is the difference between these two pieces of material” (one was aluminum, the other stainless) and other such things. I remember being surprised/disappointed that there were grown people who couldn’t read a tape measure.
I’ve worked in machine shops and drafting offices for years now, and I’m no longer surprised by people who can’t use basic measuring tools. Still disappointed though.
There’s a great test for programmers called FizzBuzz. It’s an extremely easy task - print some numbers (maybe 1 to 100), but replace them with Fizz if they’re divisible by 3, by Buzz if they’re divisible by 5, or by FizzBuzz if they’re both.
Many reasonable people consider it way too easy - if you can write this, it doesn’t mean that you can write complex programs, or that you know the applicable languages, or that you know anything about the business domain.
But interviewers know that it’s a great test because a lot of so-called programmers still fail it.
We did a fizzbuzz interview with a candidate. He passed but I had a weird feeling about it so we asked him to do another one with 7 and 21 and he couldn’t do it even with his old code right there
Damn, dude managed to literally memorize code without having any idea of what was going on. Meanwhile, I’d spend most of my time trying to figure whether it’s div or mod that i’m supposed to use to check for the remainder of a division, I always forget which is which
Omg!
It’s not that great really. It’s not bad, but when you’re interviewing people just find a similar problem in your domain.
It is great because it allows you to eliminate bad candidates very quickly. It can’t be the only test, but it’s very useful as the first one.
It’s good for a young dev IMO because that problem has many solutions and shows the programming style of the dev as well. But I agree that having a problem that is related to the actual work is better.
I very much prefer every product of multiplication of 9 up to 3000 in a descending order.
Ypu get to see a lot more than the fizzbuzz. And still very easy task. Then you can ask about processing and memory optimizations.
OK - now I’m curious, what were the most common mistakes people made reading a tape measurer? Because I’m having trouble working out how someone could screw that up lol
We had a guy we called “10/16” (ten sixteenths) because he was told to grab some 5/8" (0.625" or 16mm) steel plate, but he couldn’t find any he could only find 10/16" and 12/16".
People will count the little lines on the tape and not remember if they are 1/32, 1/16, or 1/8.
I think metric would help this.
I worked with a girl who would say “4 and 3 ticks!” meaning 1/8ths. We laughed at her enough that she tried to improve and started saying “4 point 3!” that lead to a discussion about decimal inches. I really blew her mind when I showed her the scale in 12ths on carpenter squares.
Measure twice cut once is a saying for a reason.
Some people dont know why the metal bit riveted to the end moves…
After having a customer chew us out for something that wasn’t our fault he had us follow him to another room to discuss some more work. He borrows my tape measure and tries to measure something on the wall and the tape keeps falling over and flexing. It finally hits him in the face and hands it back to me and says “I’m not familiar with this type of tool”. I think he saw our faces turn red and eyes water up as we were trying SOOO hard not to laugh.