What, you can't expect a candidate at least have a laptop?
Honestly I would see that as a huge red flag. In western countries a used laptop costs almost nothing.
I'm sure there are outliers, but given the low cost of used ex-corporate laptops in the western world, and presumably the candidate's interest in computers and software development, it's a fairly low bar to expect a candidate to have some sort of PC (laptop, desktop, Linux, Windows, Mac - whatever). I wouldn't expect it to be modern or expensive (I do this for a job and barely spend any money on computers these days), but I'd be really surprised if a candidate had nothing available.
Why do you think the job posting doesn't explicitly mention "owning a PC" as a requirement? If it's a relevant criterion why not make it clear there? If it's not, why have it at all, only to keep it hidden in your biases?
Accepting to run random code sent by someone you don't know should be a red flag for them. Getting asked to run random code sent by someone you don't know should be a red flag for you.
and with PC is so accessible now (you can even find free PC in some cases), that tells me you are not really passionate about software dev.
This is a different problem. If a candidate said "I don't want to run the code you send me" it might be a good opportunity to talk through what it does. Maybe I'd set up a VM for them in the cloud, or we could find a mutually acceptable solution. If a candidate says "I don't own a general purpose computing device" then I would really be questioning that candidates interest in computers, and therefore ability to develop and test software for them.
> Why do you think the job posting doesn't explicitly mention "owning a PC" as a requirement?
The job description also doesn't say "owns clean clothes", but how the candidate presents themselves is certainly a consideration when hiring.
Obviously. I just figured I'd point you to the real red flags you missed instead of the "I find it weird so it's a problem" thing.
> The job description also doesn't say "owns clean clothes"
That's a false parallel. A commenter higher up already pointed out to you that the candidate could own a tablet. An iPad Pro M5 is faster than most laptops, perfectly good for coding, and not able to run any of the crap sent out by the interviewer which likely expects desktop OSes.
The advert also shouldn't mention such a thing. Some people work remotely, others could honestly tell you they'll get better clothes from the first salary. If you're interviewing someone, they're the best at the job but you stumble on this, it's definitely a red flag. For the candidate, to look elsewhere. Why would you want to work for an employer who focuses more on the sweat stains on your armpit than the actual work or your character?
And now let me paint a different picture to understand the magnitude of the unfairness in your logic. I assume you are the Leo Rampen from the website you advertise in your profile. How many red flags do you count from someone advertising a blog which at the time of writing this has a certificate expired more than a month ago, and the last content update is more than a decade old? How does this reflect on a multi-disciplinary HW/SW engineer who even works on things as critical as satellites? This is to say, don't focus of flagging trivialities. You'll probably look in all the wrong places.
There are people that do like not to do work in their free time.
They apparently couldn’t ask directly whether I owned a car, but the coded question is: “Do you have Reliable Transportation?” <wink wink> and that was a confusing question to me, at face value; I would reply with candor, “I take public transit!” which of course gave away my situation every time.
In extreme cases we can work it out but you should have something that makes up for the extra annoyance compared to 99% of applicants.
Do you actually believe what you’re saying, or have you not thought it through?
stop advocating that we discriminate against them because you feel you need your hand held.
I kinda assumed that most developers took a similar approach to me. Laptop because portable when you need it, hooked to large screens, nice keyboard, nice mouse/whatever. I don't know what having a desktop would really buy me. I do 99% of my work with the laptop docked but that remaining 1% it sure is handy to grab it and go.
If you are just making web apps, it does not matter, but I do data processing where having the headroom can make a big difference.
I do have the cheapest used laptop I could find for those moments when I might require portability.
In one instance for a data-oriented job interview I spun up a VM in the cloud because they linked a kaggle dataset for the at home test that was just a bit too big for my laptop to handle.
But to have nothing, no desktop, no laptop at all, is _odd_ for a developer. How did you get through school? If not school, then how is it a hobby-turned-profession without something to develop on?
The whole "no one should be denied access to a job" angle is weird too. What is the limit to accommodations?
Probably not common, but certainly plausible. Not everyone wants to bring work home or have hobbies that are the same as their work.
Tells you they are an extremely competent smart worker that could be surprisingly helpful in ways we don't understand.
I'd love to learn from such a person.
I knew one software developer who basically spent all his free time outside hiking and camping and rarely did anything with a computer when not working. He was a good dev and very competent. Just after being cooped up inside on a computer all week he didn’t want to spend more time on one at home.
It’s not much of a stretch beyond that to simply not owning one.
It wouldn’t stop them from being hired.
You’ve got 10,000 candidates applying. Seriously, what would make “doesn’t have a laptop” stand out to you positively? Why not just go with the 9800 applicants who do have one? Surely there’s no reason to think “broken laptop = good dev”. It’s so much easier to simply go with a candidate who has no problems. Beyond that, what’s the deal with making candidates do stuff on their own machines anyways? You don’t know what’s on there. You don’t even know if it’s stable enough for a test, and none of that has any bearing at all on their skill.
I’ve never worked in the Bay Area, but if this is common practice, I think I dodged a bullet.
I don't know about "should" but there are many things that must be working in order for you to get a job. If they are not then you won't get a job.
It happens:)