Ask HN: As a recent CS grad, what am I doing wrong? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: As a recent CS grad, what am I doing wrong?

2 pointsopensourcebegin5 comments

Hello everyone,

I recently graduated with my Bachelors. I have been going through the interview process.

Yesterday, I had an interview with one of the big software companies. (Not going to name) The interviewer asked me one of the regular programming questions which I completely blanked out on. At the end of the interview, I felt that he was very insulting to me (I am unsure if this is normal). He told me that he could not figure out where to place me and that I should go get a Masters. He also said that my skill set was too broad and not focused enough. Granted my GPA has suffered last year to lower than the average. I have been very involved in projects ever since I can remember. I even founded a research project which I wrote a proposal for and got academic funding towards.

I did mess up his question. But what else did I do that was wrong?

I will take one of his advice. To find something to focus towards. I want to start contributing to open source projects in the hopes of finding something I can be passionate about. Could I get suggestions on how to begin? I am very new to this.

Thank you for reading my rant. I have been reading articles from here for a while now. You people are truly amazing.

Thank you! I am lost in transition

Don't be discouraged by the comment. It is not normal but I have heard the big 5 software companies tend to be arrogant during interviewing.

It sounds like you simply weren't technically prepared and qualified for the position. That is correctable!

1) Interview prep. Here are the 4 standard books to prepare for programming interviews at big companies like Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon.

- Programming Interviews Exposed - Cracking the Coding Interview - Elements of Programming Interviews - Ace the Programming Interview

2) Open Source - Get involved today! Pick a big open source project like Mozilla. Big projects have great resources and programs to get new people involved. For example Mozilla has mentored bugs where the mentor helps you along from environment setup to submitting the code.

3) Hobby Projects - Pick a technology/platform/framework that interests you. Read up on basic tutorials and setup the development environment. Get the server running. Get the code to compile. Take small steps. Ask for help. You can find answers to basic questions on stackoverflow etc.

Thank you so much!

I am looking through Mozilla's mentored bugs. THIS IS AMAZING!

Thank you!!!

Keep interviewing. You'll run into jerks everywhere, even after you land the job. Key is to never, ever give up.

I second this, Never ever give up. Not today, tomorrow or ever. Its the moment you give up you lose. Keep on pushing.

Thank you! The both of you!

I will never give up.

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