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As has been stated, and mentioned, IIFE's and .bind, .call, etc don't really have much place in modern JS anymore. If there are any devs who blissfully don't know about them, that wouldn't really surprise me.
However... I do think that knowledge of these constructs does say something about a developer if they've taken the time to dig into these aspects of a language. It does (in my mind) say something about a candidates thoroughness, and commitment to depth of knowledge in their craft.
Does it say much if you don't know them? Not really.
Would I use it as a selection criterion on it's own? Absolutely not.
But... is it a useful question? IMO yes... as part of a series of increasing technical questions to ask of a candidate when understanding the depth of their knowledge and the limits of their exploration in a language.
This is a great point. And in case I wasn't clear about it in the original article, lemme make it totally clear here:
I'm not mad, at anyone, for asking any kinda interview question.
You wanna ask me about assembling byte code in my interview? Sure. Ask away. You wanna ask me to do my whiteboard coding in emojicode? Hey... it's your interview! And you can put whatever restrictions on me that suit you and/or your company.
The only "problem" that I have with these kinds of questions is that, when they're asked, you can almost feel this sense of judgment coming from the interviewer. It's usually implied (or even - outright stated) that this particular esoteric concept is one they believe that you should know if you're a "real" developer - or if you're a solid prospect for the job.
You can ask anything in an interview. But ideally, you're taking all of the answers as smaller pieces in a much larger puzzle that is: the candidate.
I totally understand that, if you're looking for a top-notch JS dev, and you ask him about .call()/.apply()/.whatever(), it's probably a good sign if they know all about it, and they can talk about the concepts inside-and-out. But it's not necessarily a bad sign if they aren't familiar with it. It's just part of the broader picture.
In some interviews that I've conducted in the past, I did indeed start to wonder "just how deep does this person's knowledge go??" And in those scenarios, I absolutely started asking more esoteric questions. But when I reach the point where I'm asking about something they're unfamiliar with, I typically let them know that it's no big deal, and I was just curious if they knew about that particular concept.
There's another element here, that I'm perfectly willing to admit is a "valid" use for such questions:
Sometimes you wanna ask really "arcane" kinda questions because you wanna see how a candidate responds when you find something that they're not familiar with. Do they try to BS their way through it? Do they stare at the whiteboard and "freeze up"? Or do they just tell you, "I'm sorry, I'm not really familiar with that concept" ??
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A nice article, and a fun read!
As has been stated, and mentioned, IIFE's and .bind, .call, etc don't really have much place in modern JS anymore. If there are any devs who blissfully don't know about them, that wouldn't really surprise me.
However... I do think that knowledge of these constructs does say something about a developer if they've taken the time to dig into these aspects of a language. It does (in my mind) say something about a candidates thoroughness, and commitment to depth of knowledge in their craft.
Does it say much if you don't know them? Not really.
Would I use it as a selection criterion on it's own? Absolutely not.
But... is it a useful question? IMO yes... as part of a series of increasing technical questions to ask of a candidate when understanding the depth of their knowledge and the limits of their exploration in a language.
This is a great point. And in case I wasn't clear about it in the original article, lemme make it totally clear here:
You wanna ask me about assembling byte code in my interview? Sure. Ask away. You wanna ask me to do my whiteboard coding in emojicode? Hey... it's your interview! And you can put whatever restrictions on me that suit you and/or your company.
The only "problem" that I have with these kinds of questions is that, when they're asked, you can almost feel this sense of judgment coming from the interviewer. It's usually implied (or even - outright stated) that this particular esoteric concept is one they believe that you should know if you're a "real" developer - or if you're a solid prospect for the job.
You can ask anything in an interview. But ideally, you're taking all of the answers as smaller pieces in a much larger puzzle that is: the candidate.
I totally understand that, if you're looking for a top-notch JS dev, and you ask him about .call()/.apply()/.whatever(), it's probably a good sign if they know all about it, and they can talk about the concepts inside-and-out. But it's not necessarily a bad sign if they aren't familiar with it. It's just part of the broader picture.
In some interviews that I've conducted in the past, I did indeed start to wonder "just how deep does this person's knowledge go??" And in those scenarios, I absolutely started asking more esoteric questions. But when I reach the point where I'm asking about something they're unfamiliar with, I typically let them know that it's no big deal, and I was just curious if they knew about that particular concept.
There's another element here, that I'm perfectly willing to admit is a "valid" use for such questions:
Sometimes you wanna ask really "arcane" kinda questions because you wanna see how a candidate responds when you find something that they're not familiar with. Do they try to BS their way through it? Do they stare at the whiteboard and "freeze up"? Or do they just tell you, "I'm sorry, I'm not really familiar with that concept" ??