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Comment by recursive | Hacker News Reader

> At what time, during any job you've had, have you needed to instantly write code on a whiteboard, in front of peers, in a matter of minutes.

Fairly regularly. Like when I'm explaining to someone how something works after they've asked me about it.

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You regularly have to instantly write code for a problem from undergrad CS coursework on a whiteboard, and for which you haven't necessarily been involved in working on, in a constrained time with your job hanging in the balance?

I'm skeptical.

?? it's not something that's hard to do, it's like the foundation of my career. I use the principles all the time. my whiteboard /verbal / code solutions are based on that.

Using the principles all the time is different from regularly reimplementing CS textbook trivia under conditions in which your job is on the line. Where do you work, that you have to constantly re-invent the wheel over and over again under such constraints? I'd consider such a job to be hell. Not hard, just tedious and uninteresting to the point of pain.

I'd also not consider it to be an engineering job. What you describe seems to me to be more like a CAD technician job at an engineering firm.

No. You just changed the question. Even most whiteboard interviews don't meet your newly narrowed criteria. I just meant to state that I regularly write code on a whiteboard in my real work. You could argue it's time constrained too. At least as much as it would be in an interview.

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