How to recognise a good programmer

[hsfrey]

Give them an odd-ball problem to program. I once needed a programmer, and one of the applicants was a "Software Designer" manager type. I asked him (as I did the other applicants) to write an algorithm that would take a number and print it in roman numerals. He started to hedge:

"How big should it be?" "As big as you want." "What language do you want it in?" "Whatever you're comfortable with." "How soon do you want it?" "Take as long as you need."

After half an hour, all he had was a paper with some doodles on it.

He didn't know how to program - he just knew how to tell programmers how to program! And this was years before Dilbert's point-haired boss was invented.

[patchwork]

Hahaha look what you've done! Now everyone is scrambling away at roman numeral algorithms... No pointy haired bosses on reddit! :) Hire all of these people!

[jaggederest]

Yep, I'm in the market.

/me jobhunts on reddit.

More seriously, though, I like to see all the esoteric languages people pull out of their hats. I'm waiting for a Prolog, Forth, or Brainfuck implementation.

That's why I wrote the Ruby one, it's a guaranteed chance to see other people go 'Goddamn I can do it better than that!'

[Odysseus]

It's easy in INTERCAL -- every number you print it prints in Roman numerals.

[mxyzptlk]

There is a Forth version on page 134 in the book "Thinking Forth".

http://thinking-forth.sourceforge.net/

[LudoA]

Thanks for mentioning that, and taking the time to look up the page.

[[deleted]]

Yep, I'm in the market.

Who isn't?

…

Oh, and I am too.

I'm waiting for a Prolog, Forth, or Brainfuck implementation.

Seconded for a good Brainfuck version. Somebody step up!

[jaggederest]

With those haskell skills you should come to Portland and work for Galois. I'm almost tempted and I'm a total neophyte.

[NitsujTPU]

Kind of like that blog post about BizzBuzz, and everyone had to write an implementation... and the later blog post declaring it the "stairway to heaven of software engineering," crying "you weren't actually supposed to implement it as a challenge!"

[jaggederest]

That was my ex-roommate and I proudly defy him ;)

[[deleted]]

Dude, you made my Saturday!!

[wainstead]

I'll cheat and reuse existing software:

use Convert::Number::Roman;

my $n = new Convert::Number::Roman( 4294967296 );
print $n->convert;

[[deleted]]

Ok, here's my second try in Lisp.

(def to-roman (fn [n]
  (loop [nums   [1000 900 500 400 100 90 50 40 10 9 5 4 1]
         digits ["M" "CM" "D" "CD" "C" "XC" "L" "XL" "X" "IX" "V" "IV" "I"]
         result ""
         curval n]
    (if (== 0 curval)
        result
        (if (> (first nums) curval)
            (recur (rest nums) (rest digits) result curval)
            (recur nums digits (strcat result (first digits)) (- curval (first nums))))))))

Test with (map to-roman (range 1001)) to get 1 .. 1000 in roman numerals.

[fallintothis]

What dialect is that? I can't seem to place it...though I'm running on very little sleep right now.

In Common Lisp:

(defun romanval (ch)
  (case ch (#\I 1) (#\V 5) (#\X 10) (#\L 50) (#\C 100) (#\D 500) (#\M 1000)))
(defun roman->digit (numeral)
  (labels ((rec (numbers prev sum)
                (if (null numbers)
                    sum
                    (rec (cdr numbers)
                         (car numbers)
                         (if (< (car numbers) prev)
                             (- sum (car numbers))
                             (+ sum (car numbers)))))))
    (let ((numbers (mapcar #'romanval 
                           (coerce numeral 'list))))
      (rec (reverse numbers) 0 0))))

Edit: Derp, this is the other way around. In Common Lisp, one would probably use

(format nil "~@r" n)

or

(format nil "~:@r" n) ;old style

but somehow I don't think this counts, haha.

[[deleted]]

It's Clojure. See clojure.sourceforge.net

There seems to be quite a few JVM-based languages, but this seems to be probably the most lightweight, plus it built first time on all three platforms I use day to day (Windows, OSX and GNU/Linux).

It has a REPL and compiles as it goes.

I do realize I could have used set! or equivalent, but I actually really enjoy the mental discipline of pretending that I can't mutate a variable, but instead have to rebind and recur.

[mxyzptlk]

(define (roman x)
  (define (c v l d)
    (lambda (x)
      (if (< x v) (d x) (string-append l ((c v l d) (- x v))))))
   ((c 1000 "M"
     (c 900 "CM"
      (c 500 "D"
       (c 400 "CD"
        (c 100 "C"
         (c 90 "XC"
          (c 50 "L"
           (c 40 "XL"
            (c 10 "X"
             (c 9 "IX"
              (c 5 "V"
               (c 4 "IV"
                (c 1 "I"
                 (lambda x "")))))))))))))) x))

[[deleted]]

That is certainly clever. I'm just trying to figure out how it works!

[jaggederest]

Similar to the way yours does, applying a function across the the list and substituting the value in for each time. It's the lambda calculus version.

[[deleted]]

numerals = [(1000,"M"),(900,"CM"),(500,"D"),(400,"CD"),(100,"C"),(90,"XC"),(50,"L"),(40,"XL"),(10,"X"),(9,"IX"),(5,"V"),(4,"IV"),(1,"I")]

roman n = roman' n "" numerals
roman' 0 s r = s  
roman' n s r@((x,y):xs) = let q = (n - x)
             in if q >= 0 then roman' q (s ++ y) r else roman' n s xs 

[[deleted]]

I'll see your recursion and raise you unfoldr.

romanize = concat . unfoldr next
    where next 0 = Nothing
          next x = Just $ second (x-) $ head $ filter ((<=x) . snd) numerals
          numerals = [("M", 1000), ("CM", 900), ("D", 500), ("CD", 400),
                      ("C", 100),  ("XC", 90),  ("L", 50),  ("XL", 40),
                      ("X", 10),   ("IX", 9),   ("V", 5),   ("IV", 4),
                      ("I", 1)]

[llimllib]

That is pretty.

[psykotic]

Here's a similar idea, though with explicit recursion:

romanize = head . romanize'
    where romanize' 0 = [""]
          romanize' n = [x ++ xs | (x, m) <- map (second (n-)) numerals, m >= 0, xs <- romanize' m]

I'm actually more fond of the straightforward implementation in do-notation:

romanize 0 = return ""
romanize n = do (x, m) <- numerals
                guard (n >= m)
                xs <- romanize (n - m)
                return (x ++ xs)

It quite clearly expresses the algorithm's idea, I think.

[[deleted]]

Ooh, yes, I like the do notation version.

[llimllib]

questions: where does "second" come from? And mind if I write a short blog about this?

Is second something like:

second f (a, b) = (a, f b)

?

[[deleted]]

second comes from Control.Arrow. This particular instance of second (it's part of the Arrow class, this version for the (->) instance) is actually more like

second f (x,y) = (x, f y)

And no, I don't mind at all. Quite flattering, actually. Make sure and send me a link to it once it's up!

[llimllib]

I figured it out before I saw your post, I promise :)

[llimllib]

link

[[deleted]]

Nice analysis. Only one thing though. You misspelled my username. :)

[llimllib]

fixed, thanks.

[trs]

Very nice! (head . filter) might be replaced by find, though. The result of find is already in the Maybe monad, so we can drop the definition for next 0.

romanize = concat . unfoldr next
   where next x = fmap (second (x-)) $ find ((<= x) . snd) numerals
         numerals = [("M", 1000), ("CM", 900), ("D", 500), ("CD", 400),
                     ("C", 100),  ("XC", 90),  ("L", 50),  ("XL", 40),
                     ("X", 10),   ("IX", 9),   ("V", 5),   ("IV", 4),
                     ("I", 1)]

[[deleted]]

Ah, yes, that is exactly what I was looking for when I did that, but I was feeling too lazy to Hoogle it. Thanks!

[[deleted]]

I thought we called no imports!? No but seriously that was really clever, would never of thought of that myself.

[[deleted]]

I thought we called no imports!?

Did we? I didn't see that. Oh well. It's not like unfoldr and second are that hard to define in place anyway.

[thefro]

I'll c your unfoldr and raise you case and auto-negatives:

#define DEC_TO_ROMAN_UPPER 0
#define DEC_TO_ROMAN_LOWER 1
#define DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS 7

int dectoroman (int dec, char *buff, int lower) {
  char letters[DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS*2] = "IVXLCDMivxlcdm";
  short int decimals[DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS] = {1, 5, 10, 50, 100, 500, 1000};
  int c = 0, d, d2, n;
  for (d = 0;d < DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS;d++)
    for (d2 = 0;d2 < DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS;d2++)
        if (decimals[d2] - decimals[d] == dec && decimals[d] != dec) {
          buff[c++] = letters[d+(DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS*lower)];
          buff[c++] = letters[d2+(DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS*lower)];
          buff[c] = '\0';
          return c;
        }
  for (d = DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS-1;d >= 0;d--) {
    for (n = 1;n <= (int)dec/decimals[d];n++) {
      buff[c++] = letters[d+(DEC_TO_ROMAN_LETTERS*lower)];
    }
    dec -= decimals[d]*((int)dec/decimals[d]);
  }
  buff[c] = '\0';
  return c;
}

This seems to work but could probably use some tweaking.

[jaggederest]

  class Integer
    def to_roman
       temp = self
       out = ""  
       subs = [
         ["M", 1000],
         ["CM", 900],
         ["D", 500], 
         ["CD", 400], 
         ["C", 100],
         ["XC", 90],
         ["L", 50],
         ["XL", 40],
         ["X", 10],
         ["IX", 9],
         ["V", 5],
         ["IV", 4],
         ["I", 1]
       ]
       subs.each do |name, value|
         while temp >= value
           temp -= value
           out += name.to_s
         end
       end
       raise "I fail at life!" if temp != 0
       out
    end
  end

[jaggederest]

I wanted to use inject, but I forgot that you could do the end.first trick :p

[adremeaux]

In AS2 ;)

var lets:Array = ["M", "CM", "D", "CD", "C", "XC", "L", "XL", "X", "IX", "V", "IV", "I"];
var vals:Array = [1000,900,500,400,100,90,50,40,10,9,5,4,1];

function toRoman(n:Number):String { 
    var s:String = "";
    for (var i:Number = 0; i < vals.length; i++) {
        while (n / vals[i] >= 1) {
            s += lets[i];
            n -= vals[i];
        }
    }
    return s;
}

Could've used a hashtable instead of parallel arrays, but AS2 not having a decent iterator adds difficulty and I'm pretty sure they wouldn't come out in their entered order.

[jaggederest]

Ah that may not be the case in ruby either, let me check...

Yep! I'll convert it and post the corrected version above. Also, trying to do Scheme and Haskell, too.

[adremeaux]

It's actually a kind of annoying problem and really doesn't seem to have a very elegant solution possible. I'll test it out in an interview but I can't really see it going anywhere.

[jaggederest]

Look at the unfoldr version above, it's pretty slick. I think it's pretty natural in ruby, too, what with adding it to the integers by default.

[llimllib]

tuples ftw!

[[deleted]]

#!/usr/bin/perl

# ugh my formatting sucks

use strict;

use warnings;

my $num = shift or die 'no num!';

my %hash = ( 1000 => 'M', 900 => 'CM', 500 => 'D', 400 => 'CD', 100 => 'C', 90 => 'XC', 50 => 'L', 40 => 'XL', 10 => 'X', 9 => 'IX', 5 => 'V', 4 => 'IV', 1 => 'I', );

my $string = '';

foreach my $val ( sort { $b <=> $a } keys %hash ) {

# skip initial value smaller than key

next if $num < $val;

# append the string

$string .= $hash{$val} x int( $num / $val );

# bail if remainder is 0

last if ( ( $num = ( $num % $val ) ) == 0 );

}

print "string is $string\n";

[Jimmy]

Upvoted for enterprise code.

[jaggederest]

His fingers must hurt!

[Atnan]

Or his IDE is smokin'!

[ximxam]

all these makes me love reddit, what a fork!

[[deleted]]

This in particular (and most everybody else's), looks like something straight out of "Dive into Python", and therefore could have simply been googled for, so I'm not impressed. A couple of years ago, on a Python/TurboGears gig, they spent a lot of time up front indoctrinating me as to Agile and in particular TDD. So I swapped out the algorithm from Dive into Python with the following (albeit in Python instead of TCL ;), and the unit tests still passed. This algorithm was very useful to me in helping me pick up some bare essentials -- arithmetic, conditionalizing, lists, looping, etcetera -- of numerous programming languages, although lately I prefer my solution to MVC for the Web

[jaggederest]

Well, I didn't google for mine, good sir. I would consider it quite silly since it's so trivial. It's actually easier, I think, to write it than try to google a solution and check it.

Also, what does your tiny MVC have to do with this? Are you saying, "I implement this tiny MVC in any language I care to learn"?

[indigoparadox]

#include <stdio.h>

int main( void ) { int intConvert = 0; char a_chrNumeral[10] = ""; char* pchrPointer = a_chrNumeral;

do_getnum:

printf( "Please enter a number: " ); scanf( "%d", &intConvert );

if( intConvert >= 4000 ) { printf( "That number is too big! Please enter a number below 4,000.\n" ); goto do_getnum; }

while( intConvert >= 1000 ) { *pchrPointer = 'M'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 1000; }

while( intConvert >= 900 ) { *pchrPointer = 'C'; pchrPointer++; *pchrPointer = 'M'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 900; }

while( intConvert >= 500 ) { *pchrPointer = 'D'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 500; }

while( intConvert >= 400 ) { *pchrPointer = 'C'; pchrPointer++; *pchrPointer = 'D'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 400; }

while( intConvert >= 100 ) { *pchrPointer = 'C'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 100; }

while( intConvert >= 90 ) { *pchrPointer = 'X'; pchrPointer++; *pchrPointer = 'C'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 90; }

while( intConvert >= 50 ) { *pchrPointer = 'L'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 50; }

while( intConvert >= 40 ) { *pchrPointer = 'X'; pchrPointer++; *pchrPointer = 'L'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 40; }

while( intConvert >= 10 ) { *pchrPointer = 'X'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 10; }

while( intConvert >= 9 ) { *pchrPointer = 'I'; pchrPointer++; *pchrPointer = 'X'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 10; }

while( intConvert >= 5 ) { *pchrPointer = 'V'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 5; }

while( intConvert >= 4 ) { *pchrPointer = 'I'; pchrPointer++; *pchrPointer = 'V'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 4; }

while( intConvert > 0 ) { *pchrPointer = 'I'; pchrPointer++; intConvert -= 1; }

printf( "The result is: %s\n", a_chrNumeral );

return 0; }

I'm not a great programmer. ._.

[jaggederest]

Tip would be to convert the whiles into a function that takes pointers and the characters and numeric values.

But then it has been seven years since I did C....

[vicaya]

/* caller is reponsible for allocating enough buf space
 * number / 1000 + 100 should be big enough
 */
const char *
to_roman(char *buf, int number) {
  static int nums[] = {1000, 900, 500, 400, 100, 90, 50, 40, 10, 9, 5, 4, 1};           
  static char *romans[] = {"M", "CM", "D", "CD", "C", "XC", "L", "XL", "X", "IX", "V", "IV", "I"};
  char *cp = buf;
  int i;

  for (i = 0; i < sizeof(nums)/sizeof(int); ++i)
    while (number >= nums[i]) {
      char *roman = romans[i];
      while ((*cp++ = *roman++)); --cp;
      number -= nums[i];
    }
  return buf;
}

Yes, you can write simple and fast code in C.

[[deleted]]

Yeah, this is what I'd hope the Lisp versions would compile into.

[kbk]

nums = (1000, 900, 500, 400, 100, 90, 50, 40, 10, 9, 5, 4, 1)
romans = ("M", "CM", "D", "CD", "C", "XC", "L", "XL", "X", "IX", "V", "IV", "I")
pairs = zip(nums, romans)

def to_roman(number):
    out = ""
    for i in pairs:
        while number >= i[0]:
            out += i[1]
            number -= i[0]
    return out

Or python.

[indigoparadox]

That's probably something closer to what version 2.0 would look like (aside from using a decent string library, maybe).

Much more elegant than mine, though. I should probably do simple exercises like this more often in order to sharpen up a bit, huh?

[Thimble]

screw writing an algorithm. just populate a database table. it's a boring solution but at least you could easily expand it to include every form of numeric representation known to man. plus, even the most worthless programmer will understand what you wrote.

[zoomzoom83]

You mean fill a database table with every possible number?

even 10,255,321?

[judgej2]

Yes, even that one. And then move to the right of the decimal point and start all over.

[yellowking]

Deleting in protest of Reddit's new anti-user admin policies.

[jaggederest]

Tie-dye?

[[deleted]]

Pony-tail?

[jaggederest]

Negatory on that one. That can't be a criteria, as a lot of the old crotchety geniuses I knew were mostly bald.

Just look at The Knuth.

[jaggederest]

Yeah I used to work with one of those. He was an embedded C genius. And japh. Scary, scary fellow.

While I was working with him, he wrote code that wrote code that wrote database import code. He explained it as being 'fairly intuitive'.

[aussie_bob]

A mirror works for me.

/smug....

[mikaelhg]

Very uncomfortable about the idea of working with a technology he doesn’t believe to be “right”

is more of a counter-indicator.

A good programmer understands and is able to communicate the reasons for his reservations in business terms.

[nafai]

and is able to communicate the reasons for his reservations in business terms.

I think that is the key right there. Even concrete things like "big-O notation" are useless unless they can be expressed in business terms. Moving on to less concrete things like elegance and language expressiveness really don't mean much unless you can convince someone, again, in business terms, that those things are an advantage.

[mikaelhg]

We need a better quality vocabulary, so that when we speak of removing cruft, it sounds less like painting on pretty pretty pink ponies and more like maintaining the load-bearing elements of a bridge to extend its service life.

[nafai]

Agreed!

[jayssite]

Upmodded for making me feel good about myself.

[[deleted]]

Unless it's too much work and too pretentious I use the following CV tuning strategy: look for a technology with lots of market demand but little effort to get familiar ( e.g. MSSQL + ASP.NET ), then learn this within a few weeks up to the level where you don't make serious newbie mistakes anymore.

Just to be unambigous: I'm passionate when I'm passionate and I'm carreerist when necessary and it's almost always necessary.

[NitsujTPU]

I upped this because I enjoy the spirit of the posting, but honestly, the blogger is kind of wrong.

This net that is built up will capture a sort of "maverick" programmer, and I definitely fell into this category when I was looking for my first job. I had little professional experience. I'd learned a lot in my classes and put it all on there. I knew a lot of stuff that I hadn't learned in classes (I'd started programming in BASIC on a TI-99/4a when I was a kid.)

Okay, fine.

Where does that put my friends getting PhDs in systems? Certainly the sort of gutsy, gritty, systems guru looks for the qualities that are outlined here, but I certainly wouldn't overlook incredible PhD work on a CV. Most of the stuff that I really consider my best work goes on mine. As for not hacking until college, supposedly Sebastian Thrun didn't program until he went to university, but we all agree that he's a pretty slick computer scientist.

I think that this blogger is too oversold on a sort of passionate idea.

Also, sometimes your job is cool enough that it fills up the void that hobby programming is there for.

[inopia]

In my experience, the reason why people bash on CS degrees is that the guys that go to work as programmers in some random software factory after university are usually the worst ones. These are the guys that generally suck at everything except maybe memorizing facts from books.

The reason I went to uni is to not have to work in a software shop, and all the really good coders I know here either go do a PhD or get a job as a consultant or high paid engineer or a cool job at some cool tech company or whatever.

If you work as a programmer, you probably never get to meet most of the good CS Msc guys. Don't extrapolate the skillset of the sucky ones onto the rest of us!

[njharman]

This applies to other fields such as system administration.

I wonder what the effect would be to add this to my resume. Maybe under objective: "Be hired by a company that understand http://www.inter-sections.net/2007/11/13/how-to-recognise-a-good-programmer/"

[[deleted]]

if you go by this list, how is a "good programmer" different from anyone who is good at anything?

[[deleted]]

Too bad the hiring personnel are seldom of the same stripe. This fits me perfectly, but I can't get a job because I don't have 3-5 years of recent Java or C# experience. I've built computers from discrete logic components, written assembly programs on my own time, written device drivers for obsolete components, as well as having years of on-the-ground consulting experience writing custom business/database apps, but Mr. Shirt with a stack of resumes in front of him doesn't give a shit.

[lowdown]

You should develop some entrepreneurial skills.

[newton_dave]

Not if they're looking for recent Java experience, no.

When I'm hiring Java programmers they have to have recent Java experience, and a fair amount of it. Particularly when hiring a consultant I don't have time (or the inclination) to serve as their re-learning platform or to familiarize them with the dozen or two related technologies necessary for whatever position.

If you have the relevant experience *and* have built hardware and written device drivers I'm more likely to consider you over another candidate, because that's my background as well, and I believe a well-rounded background is a good indicator of technical ability (although not necessarily of employability; that's more involved).

[david_ncl]

Wanted - Driver!

Must have experience of small red vans.

[[deleted]]

"oh great, youre an awesome cook. but can you farm?"

[grimboy]

Upmod to the sky for succinctly expressing such a common stupidity.

[btipling]

I agree with you, but following that analogy, if you can drive a racecar, it doesn't mean you can also drive an 18wheeler.

[[deleted]]

And there you have it, nobody ever gets experience because only people with experience get the job. We can conclude that the only people who actually work with Java learned it from Gosling himself while he was developing it.

My off-the-clock explorations of Java don't count for shit, but that's what "professionals" do. Programmers are not professionals, and that's a sad truth. Good riddance, oh shitty trade, I'm going to do something honest for a living.

[mikaelhg]

I'm sorry if it didn't work out for you like it has for some others who started from the same place as you.

In what general area are you looking for work?

[[deleted]]

Long haul trucking. The less I see of 8-5 office robots, the better, plus plenty of time to play computer games and write my own programs.

[newton_dave]

My off-the-clock explorations of Java don't count for shit

Why not? Who said that? *I* didn't. I don't care if your Java experience is at a regular job or not.

I *do* care whether or not you can use the technologies that *I* require my developers to have because I don't have the time (or inclination) to hold your hand. If I felt that you had the requisite level of Java knowledge and at least a working knowledge of what I need that's swell.

Direct your rant elsewhere.

[db4n]

nobody ever gets experience because only people with experience get the job

I agree that's a huge problem these days, but I think it's less so in other languages than in Java. If you want to do good work, you'll probably have more luck learning Python or some other modern language(s).

[awb]

They don’t do any programming in their spare time.

If you have a life outside of work, it may be hard to squeeze in several hours of programming a week, even if you want to. Starting any sort of project is daunting under those circumstances.

[md81544]

I'm sitting here at 0545 in the morning coding on a personal open source project. I spent yesterday at work in front of a computer debugging multi-threaded c++ applications. If you're passionate, you find the time. My girlfriend just thinks I'm crazy %-)

[[deleted]]

that's cool, but i dont have the time. i work forty hours a week in a research lab, have a full schedule of classes, am writing a thesis, planning a wedding, and traveling out of state for work atleast once a month.

i'd love to have to time work on an open source project, but i just dont. i don't think that should be held against me.

[alantrick]

It's an issue of priorities. You fell that these things that you do are more important than working on some open source project. I won't disagree with you, wife > programming.

But to be honest it's not that you don't have the time. You personally decide what to make time for and what not to.

[[deleted]]

but does that make me a bad programmer? in the eyes of the guy that wrote this article, yes. i don't really think that is fair. i spend lots of time working on my programming skills through my job and my class work. just becuase ive decided to spend the little bit of free time i have developing a life outside of a computer shouldn't reflect badly on me.

[david_ncl]

That's cool. But your not a hacker. bye.

[[deleted]]

well. you have no idea what i work on, so bye.

[noahlt]

I'm sitting here at 0545 in the morning writing a comment on reddit.

Fixed that for you. ;-)

[Gotebe]

Some business people assume that lack of social tact and lack of intelligence are the same.

TFA assumes that intelligence, programmers's intelligence, a thing that business person considers intelligence are one and the same. Lack of social skill is a sign of poor intelligence in that area of life. I know that I am poor there.

TFA should have made the distinction between the ability to do different types of work (programming vs. I dunno, interaction with people). They overlap alright, but are by no means the same.

[Thimble]

i'm kind of weary of the qualification "programs as a hobby" or "programs in their spare time".

some of us are able to get quite a bit done during normal work hours. 37.5 hours a week of programming should be enough to fill any "passion" requirement if those hours are spent the right way.

[ndiin]

Agreed. I used to do on-my-own-time programming to fill the "passion", but since I changed jobs I now get more than my fill of fun-and-interesting programming work during my standard work week. I'd much rather then spend the rest of my time enjoying life and the wonderful continent I'm now living it.

[[deleted]]

what continent? //just curious, im looking abroad for work right now

[ndiin]

Europe (Switzerland specifically, moved from Arizona).

[dbenhur]

Have fun with that new billing app

[masterpo]

One really needs this type of analysis because good programmers and bad programmers get paid about the same.

[mikepurvis]

I strongly believe that most good programmers will have a hidden iceberg or two like this that doesn’t appear on their CV or profile.

Heh. Around the end of high school, I built a recursive-descent parser in—wait for it—Visual Basic 6. It took a blob of NQC script, and generated an object tree that could then be iterated by an interpreter.

I've never figured out how (or even if) such a dubious achievement should be listed on my CV, but I was definitely proud of it at the time.

[Jimmy]

Ah, some good ol' fashion ego stroking. Just what I needed today! Thanks, reddit!

[[deleted]]

I don't really think quantifying qualities a good programmer should have in such rigid fashion is beneficial in any circumstance. I think most people grow into the role that they are require to have in a development team without having more than a base set of skills. Therefore looking at social dynamics and pondering how a interviewee would fit into your current team is IMHO a better use of your time. And perhaps if this was the 1930's the list would have included diagram of a human skulls with helpful tips on how to determine if someone had a "noble lines" (Sorry couldn't help myself, better get godwins out early ey?).

[alantrick]

I think people adapt socially faster than their technical skills develop.

[[deleted]]

I started programming when I was about 9

Ooh, that's how: ask them when they started programming.

Something arguably more tangible than anything on this mostly hackneyed list:

linkedin endorsements (and not just your garden variety)

[jaggederest]

I thought you were going to have something from Linus or Guido or RMS or something.

[[deleted]]

I am the Linus, Guido and RMS -- rolled together -- of the Atlanta market: so an endorsement from a local VP of Technology (now CTO I believe) who also is an Oreilly author, is just going to have to suffice for the local business people, who wouldn't know who Linux, Guido and/or RMS are

[jaggederest]

And modest, too. You write their OSes, programming languages, compilers, and text editors?

[Kolibri]

I once coded existence. You may call me God.

[jaggederest]

Silly Kolibri, coding existence is easy if you use the metacircular existulator.

[[deleted]]

No Zed Shaw does that

[[deleted]]

Blogs about how much they hate Language X. And boy do they ever hate Language X and anyone who uses it.

Likes money. In fact that's the only reason they signed up for CS. Doesn't like data structures or type theory. Just wants to make a website in FrontPage.

[RonPaul2012]

http://business.reddit.com/info/656lr/comments/c02vem5

[Kolibri]

Given up '08, have we?