

Show HN: Had nowhere to practice coding interviews, so we built Pramp - davidglauber
https://www.pramp.com/practice

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levimatan
Nice idea. Coding interviews are a true pain for so many hackers. I like the
approach of connecting similar people to help each other improve. That makes a
lot of sense, especially for geeks.

But that also seems somewhat troubling... especially because I'd normally
inexperienced or first time job seekers using the site. Would that be like the
blind leading the blind in a sense? There is a lot to learn to turn into a
good interviewer.

Even if you don't test someone's ability, having them declare if they are
interested in conducting interviews or being mock interviewed would likely get
a good separation and better experience for all.

~~~
davidglauber
Peer practice isn't professional coaching, but we think you don't really need
a pro to prep well. You just need the right practice buddy and good prep
materials.

We pair you up against someone similar to you and provide full prep material
(problems, solutions and specific tips and guidance) ahead of time. Both you
and your peer with interview the other after you know how a right solution
should look like and how to judge other solutions. You can also access the
problems & solutions after your interview and learn about it.

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davidglauber
Hey HN, one of the co-founders of Pramp here. We're a free peer-2-peer
practice platform for coding interviews. It's like online dating for technical
interviews.

After a few years of coding interviews, my friend and I noticed we always have
a hard time finding good practice buddies. The web is full or great interview
prep resources for self-learning: books, blogs, coding challenges and Q&A
sites. Yet, there's no free place to practice live interviews. Interviewing is
not something you can learn from a book or from coding by yourself. This is
because interviewing and coding are 2 different skills.

Pramp pairs you to other hackers at your level to practice interviews
together. On each interview both your and your peer will interview the other.
We take care of everything you need to prep well: scheduling, interview
problems & solutions, video chat, collaborative code editor and peer written
feedback.

Would love to hear your feedback and thoughts.

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jseeff
Hey - I really like the idea! Can you explain how the interview process will
actually work? Do you oversee the interview process or is it a nominated
"interviewer"? I'm also interested to know - can anyone sign up to be an an
interviewer or do you select a pool of interviewers who then conduct the
interviews for users? How do you incentivise people to act as interviewers?
Finally (as i'm not too techy) will there by a way for beginners / less
developed coders to practice too?

~~~
davidglauber
Thanks!

Practice interviews on Pramp are bi-directional. Every user is both an
interviewee and an interviewer on each interview. We oversee the process by
matching between likeminded peers with similar skills, background and
abilities and by providing prep material before interviews.

We're not a fit for beginners yet, as our interview questions take solid
understanding of CS & coding just like real technical interview at tech
companies. However, we plan to add this later.

~~~
jseeff
Fair enough- looking forward to the beginner mode :)

So over time is it that a user get ranked for being a better or less good
interviewer and the better you are, the higher level of interview partner you
get?

~~~
davidglauber
Yes. We consider that when pairing you to your peers to make sure that you are
both a fit for each other.

------
soham
Thanks David. This is pretty good.

I'll start recommending this service to students in our interview prep
bootcamp ([http://interviewkickstart.com](http://interviewkickstart.com)), who
want more practice. We also do intense practice and mock interviews, but they
are with seasoned interviewers working at Google etc, and hence there is a
cost to it.

