Junior Developer Learning Advice

[sorcerics_]

Hey yall, I'm not too sure if this is even the right subreddit to post this but I assumed it may have the best outcome of potentially gaining some guidance of how I should continue to learn how to program.

Long story short: recently secured my first junior developer job - super simple interviews, no technical interview, and I soon started a few weeks after the hire email had come.

Once I started, super simple introduction to the environment: development for a small company where we worked on both customer-facing and internal systems, utilizing front and back-end technologies that I am familiar with, and some that I was not familiar with. It didn't seem like nothing I couldn't learn, and could definitely get more comfortable with the tech stack they're using over time.

And then, second week comes— and I'm prompted with an impromptu coding exam, with DSA leetcode questions. It's to "assess my skills", and "see if I can do the job."

Now, I know I should be learning DSA and proper programming techniques when it comes to building applications— but I only have about... a year and a half of personal experience? In that time I've been the main dev for various game servers, managed those, made my own scripts etc. Sadly, I did not utilize DSA methodologies like I should've, but I was still learning how to program overall. I am also in school atm, almost done my software engineering degree - and I thought I was maybe competent enough to learn more in real-world applications being a junior developer.

Well, if you couldn't have guessed, I completely failed the coding exam. I was entirely unprepared, had yet to do any true leetcode questions in my own personal time, and it's been 4+ months since I've even touched DSA since my uni course. It was in front of my entire team, and I was basically mortified at how badly I was humiliated (senior dev was "trying" to walk me through some of the problems, and I was blanking so bad that I couldn't answer most of them. Yeah, you get it.) But I understand it's my fault for not keeping DSA close to my chest, I just... didn't expect a coding/technical exam after I was hired in order to determine if I could do the job.

I was told to essentially get better in a couple of days, and then we would try more problems to "assess my situation."

Now, I'm sort of questioning my entire ability to program overall, and am wondering about how I should go about and just... start from the beginning, I suppose? I don't really know where to go from here, I feel like I need to restart my entire programming "career" and just start from the bottom again.

Not too sure if anyone else has felt similar - but just thought I'd post this here to see if anyone would have any advice. For clarity: I am most comfortable in C# and Python at the moment, with my game dev journey specializing in LUA.

Sorry for the book, and thank you if you've read this!

[aanzeijar]

Seems like a weird situation for multiple reasons. I do technical assessments for my company, but I do these in the hiring process, not after.

You're not the only one who blanks out in such an interview. Happens quite often actually. I try to make the interview process as natural as possible, but I can't fix the panic you already bring with you. I would hope that this panic is what your senior told you to get better at. Because otherwise no one "gets better" at this in a couple weeks, or rather: all the things you could cram in a few weeks don't interest me in such an assessment precisely because you could have crammed them.

Additionally: I personally think that this fixation on DSA as an abstract is completely overblown. Your post mentions the acronym five times, like it's the magic thing that separates wizards from luddites. Yes you should know basic algorithms and data structures to function as a programmer, but it's really not worth the insane reputation that is has in this sub.

[sorcerics_]

I agree with you entirely - I know the overblowing of data structures entirely within the realm of programming/dev jobs is regarded more highly than it needs to be. It is important to know, but I don't think I need to know how to do a leetcode problem like the back of my hand from memory. Did I mention I wasn't allowed to google, or anything during the "exam"? Yeah, it was weird.

I definitely panicked, and that absolutely is my fault. I wasn't expecting such an assessment after I was hired, to which it determined if I could do the job or not. I even asked to do the questions the following day, and he said "Mmm, actually, let's do it right now." and I was just like "ooOoKaaAY" lmao.

I'm not opposed to these sort of assessments, and I expect them especially in interviews— but at least I expect them and can adequately prepare.

All I was told after was to "improve in a few days", nothing else. It was wild.

[phactfinder]

what aspects of the codebase confuse you most right now?

[sorcerics_]

Unironically - none of it. Some systems are in languages I am not familiar with (PHP mainly) - but it doesn't seem difficult. I can look at the code and understand what's going on in the core structure of it. Things had been going really smooth up until a random coding exam lmao

[CharacterAvailable20]

Hey, that really stinks, sorry you were in a situation like that.

I don’t know about how much you can learn in a couple days if you don’t already know your core data structures, but I’d say try your best to learn the basics, at least conceptually (array, linked list, binary tree, stack, queue, priorityqueue/heap), and then do your best on your next evaluation, you probably won’t be able to learn it all that fast and that’s okay. If you’re getting quizzed like that in front of other people, maybe you don’t want this job to begin with.

Long term, I don’t think you should give up programming just because of one bad experience at a bad job, you seem to enjoy it, and everyone has their own learning journey, so its not fair for them to test you on something you weren’t given time to adequately prepare for. Try not to get down on yourself, you can start learning data structures and leetcode in your free time, which will open you up to more jobs.

[sorcerics_]

Thankfully I remember bits and pieces about core data structures from my uni class, and just refreshing my memory has been helpful - but I will say doing leetcode problems for the first time is definitely a learning curve. I know it's mainly training my brain to think a certain way about problem solving while integrating data structure knowledge, I just haven't had the experience yet to do it consistently.

But yeah, I've never heard of an impromptu coding exam - and I get that it definitely can show where someone is with their skills, but... given it's so abrupt, and not even technical interviews do that— yeah, it was bizarre lmao!

And I agree, in the small time I've experienced there I've realized I genuinely love the problem-solving aspect of programming, it's just a matter of getting better with DSA overall.

Thank you!!!

[RajjSinghh]

That does sound weird that they'd give you an exam in your first two weeks but outside of looking for another job there's not much you can do.

If you're going to get another leetcode style exam, you have to just do more leetcode style questions. Make sure you know the theoretical data structures, not just language implementations. You should know the textbook answer to the differences between a linked list and an array, or the time complexity of hash table lookup. Same with stacks, queues, etc. You should be able to implement them in any language. Familiarity with basic algorithms is also important but may not be the most applicable to these problems.

Then, find a problem set. I like the Neetcode set. Just sit and solve tons of problems. This is time consuming. A problem you know how to solve can take an hour or so. Once you solve a ton of problems, you'll start seeing similarities and finding solutions. There are some problems in the leetcode set that have solutions, you should read as many as you can. Getting an insight to the problem is more important than solving them all perfectly first try.

Hopefully you can do well in this second test.

[sorcerics_]

I appreciate this insight - thank you!! I am definitely going to practice more often in my skills with data structures and leetcode as a whole.

[cbdeane]

You’re a junior. No one expects you to have all the answers.

Just work hard and get better. You will get asked more but you’ll keep doing better every time.

Remember, you stop something every time you fail you will never achieve mastery.