gigamatic

so, today we held second interviews for the position at work... two guys, equally enthusiastic and intelligent, balanced technically.

tips:
don't wear jeans to an interview. ever.
or a tshirt or shorts.
or a ballcap.
iron your shirt!
give more than a yes or no (or even worse, an "i dunno") answer.

I asked a very broad, open ended question, that went something like this.

You've been asked to design and implement an e-commerce system for the university. Three items will be sold, all of which are uniquely configurable. Two non-traditional methods of payment will be used. These items will be made available for pick up or delivered to the customer. What are some questions you might have, and what would be some steps in your process?

The answers were very different.

Answer 1: (and I'm paraphrasing, but not much) Well, I would get the details on how each item was configurable, and then I would start building.

Answer 2: (paraphrasing again, from my notes) First, get the details about what products are configurable which way, then the details about payment processing. Find out about the customers -- how will they be using the system (use cases). Use project scope docs to keep on target with clearly defined problems and goals. Research which technologies would be the best, and will the servers be able to handle the load, and is security an issue. Get users to test at different stages of the game, including prototyping.

Guess who we went with?