I'm a Developer Not a Compiler

> A good engineer thinks abstractly in terms of designing and building systems, they think in terms of algorithms, components, and engineering design. They do not necessarily know all of the details of syntax of a given language, especially if they are used to a good IDE which does it for them...

Interviewing sucks, but on the other hand it's really hard to test system design during an interview. There are lots of algorithms, data structures, design patterns, and language features that could be asked about. That being said, experienced Java programmers will know where List is located, even if they've been using an IDE for years.

> Even the Java Certification Exams tend to focus on questions of syntax and compilation as opposed to either how well you can actually program or how well you can design a system.

Yeah, because it's about showing familiarity with the language and it's features in a way that is inexpensive to grade.

> Asking nano-questions can lead to false negatives by weeding out otherwise great fits.

I agree with this. I know that when I'm evaluating a potential employer and I'm asked those sorts of questions, I take it as a signal that I might want to pass on this one.

If you can't play it on the mouthpiece, you can't play it on the horn.