
Leonardo da Vinci's application letter - xvirk
http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/03/skills-of-da-vinci.html
======
makmanalp
Okay look, I see a lot of snarky posts here about Leonardo doing Fizzbuzz and
Leonardo being in a daylong interview session.

Guess what - Leonardo wasn't a superstar back then but he'd worked in
Verrocchio's workshop, a workshop that was one of the best in Florence. He
learned an immense level of technical skills there. Then he also was a master
in the Guild of Saint Luke in Florence. Then he painted the Adoration of the
Magi (which was never finished, but whatever). Then he made a silver lyre,
which the medici family sent to the Sforzas for a peace accord.

So the modern equivalent of this is something like (and I'm making this up
clearly) someone who started at a regionally famous company at a young age,
worked there for years to cut their teeth, meanwhile was a regular presence at
conferences or Meetup groups in the area, who then worked on a company that
generated some buzz but didn't succeed ultimately, and then one of their VCs
introduced him to another company.

So, not the same as a person with no experience to show for getting a daylong
interview with fizzbuzz and a take home project. In fact the "interview"
probably took days to weeks in that case!

edit: And yes, of course I don't think that's a good way to conduct
interviews. But it sure as hell wasn't a better or more efficient or more
equal opportunity system back then. Progress has happened since then. It just
should be happening at a much faster rate now and it's not.

~~~
herval
I saw a tweet some time ago of the creator and main maintainer of some widely
used tool (Cocoapods I think?) bombing in an interview at (Facebook|Google).
He didn't pass the whiteboard test.

Or maybe how Kent Beck hiring process went at FB: [https://www.quora.com/How-
was-Kent-Beck-recruited-to-Faceboo...](https://www.quora.com/How-was-Kent-
Beck-recruited-to-Facebook)

Edit: first case was Homebrew's creator at google:
[https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768](https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768)
(thanks, livingparadox!)

~~~
makmanalp
I think it was homebrew, that one is famous:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9695102](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9695102)

So why is this such a big deal? The assumption here is that passing a Google
interview is /the/ bar for success as a software engineer. Guy builds homebrew
(success) and guy fails google interview (fail). Cognitive dissonance!

It's not surprising that there are a diverse set of skills required for
building good software, especially if one is playing every role by themselves.
Then it's also not surprising that at a large corporate environment, each one
of these roles are usually taken on by separate people, and there is a lot
more specialization. Then it's not surprising that they're ignoring all the
other skills this person brings to the table - they're probably going to be
squandered. It's also not surprising that a large corporation with a massive
inflow of great candidates is going to have a diluted and uninteresting
interview process because no matter what they're doing, they're going to get
some good or at least motivated people one way or the other. It's yet again
unsurprising that they fail to take their own advice when their internal
studies find out that brain teaser questions or questions that don't have
anything to do with the day to day work don't really predict success, because
I think a lot of people who are established there passed through that bar, and
ascribe their success to it despite the evidence. So it's a cultural change
issue too.

Anyway, I got rejected by google when I was in college, and I took it
personally at first, and now I don't. I'm not really proud of it, but I've
learned to not think lesser of myself because of it. I have a perfectly fine
job that I enjoy and even more opportunities. So it's possible!

~~~
makmanalp
To add to this, I think it's more difficult for people who already have a hard
time - people who are from underrepresented groups, people who are
discriminated against by making automatic assumptions about their skill level,
people whose education is not a traditional diploma. These people especially
are compelled to have some other sort of unquestionable badge of merit, and
one of the Big Four on the resume helps. And yet it's doubly difficult for
them because of where they start, and because they can afford less to ignore
such a path.

------
noam87
Is this Hacker News or /r/programming?

Was hoping for a more informative discussion on one of my intellectual heroes.
To me, Da Vinci is up there in the "alien" category along with Von Neumann...
there is no field in which he not only excelled, but formed theories that were
centuries ahead of their time.

Not only in art and engineering, but in medicine and biology. In his notebooks
you can find rudimentary ideas about evolution (in his study of fossils, he
notes that different layers have different kinds, and that those at the bottom
appear to be the oldest; he then notes that the Earth must be much older than
his peers seem to think!). In medicine he noted that the arteries of people
who suffer from heart attacks are hardened and thickly coated (another
discovery that was not made until the 20th century).

There is also misconceptions about whether some of his designs worked. It was
common back then (before IP laws) for inventors to insert crucial flaws into
the schemes, with codified solutions that only they know, so that only they
could build the product.

For example, his gliding machine, lacking a tail, will bomb. Unless you are
astute enough to notice the pages where he writes down his theories about how
birds use their tail to stabilize their flight!

Lo and behold, after adding a tail, the glider works:
[http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/features/leonardo/glider.html](http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/features/leonardo/glider.html)

The list goes on. If you haven't, I thoroughly recommend reading more about
this man. He was not just a great painter and engineer, e was truly a once in
a generation mind; and all without formal training -- just his imagination and
thought experiments. Perhaps too far ahead of his time... imagine how far we'd
be had further pursued his wild ideas!

His facsimiles are also available in print, and offer a fascinating insight
into a one of a kind mind.

~~~
rcavezza
There are hundreds of books on Da Vinci. Is there one in particular you would
recommend?

~~~
noam87
Aside from biographies, which are plenty and mostly good, there's nothing
better than being able to go to the source! All of his surviving notes are
available in illustrated and annotated forms.

I found them once when I was at the uni library... before I knew it hours had
passed and I was still cross-legged on the floor going through them.

Also "Leonardo's Universe" is great to have... full of illustrations and notes
about his time.

------
notahacker
This application letter in the style of Leonardo from a few years back is
pretty special too:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1086527](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1086527)

------
wolfhumble
"Likewise in painting, I can do everything possible as well as any other,
whosoever he may be."

El Greco (1541-1614) didn't agree with him on that: When he was later asked
what he thought about Michelangelo, El Greco replied that "he was a good man,
but he did not know how to paint"
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Greco#cite_note-
Plaka47-49-...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Greco#cite_note-
Plaka47-49-24)

Not much of a reverence there! :-)

[Edit: Sorry for the mixup Leonardo! :-( Choose to let it stay so your
comments don't become orphaned]

~~~
thecopy
Well, this is Leonardo Da Vinci's letter, not Michelangelo's. Interesting
nonetheless.

~~~
VLM
I'm really sorry Michelangelo but we're only looking to hire rock star ninjas
with experience painting Last Suppers. That's nice that you paint buildings
like that chapel ceiling or whatever, but we need someone with experience in
the field who can jump right in and make a dent in the universe this week no
need to come up to speed. I also see in your resume you made sculptures and we
need someone a little more focused on last supper painting. Thanks for coming
in, we appreciate you used 10% of your annual vacation time for this 8 hour
long interview even though we decided to reject you before you got here, and
maybe in a few years with a little more experience you should re-apply?

------
gwern
I know it's easy to joke about a SV twist, but there's actually a novel,
_Radiance_ by Carter Scholz (
[http://www.gwern.net/docs/2002-radiance](http://www.gwern.net/docs/2002-radiance)
), where da Vinci's letter to Sforz is a big theme, as it encapsulates the
troubled relationship of science to the military, which repeats throughout
history and especially in Silicon Valley and the national nuclear labs
descending from the Manhattan Project. It's bleak, but it's one of my favorite
novels.

------
rodionos

      Also, I will make covered vehicles, safe and unassailable,   
      which will penetrate the enemy and their artillery, 
      and there is no host of armed men so great that they would not break through it. 
      And behind these the infantry will be able to follow, quite uninjured and unimpeded.
    

I assume this covers tanks?

~~~
VLM
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_tower](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_tower)

Really the only thing that made defensive walls useful for sieges in that era
was the fact no one had any decent portable fireproof siege towers, so most
towers ended up burnt down, unless the city under siege literally ran out of
things to light on fire and toss into the (wooden) tower.

Also see "moat".

Defensive troops on the walls were pretty good at tipping towers over with
ropes or whatever, too.

You'll note like a good engineer he promises all the easy stuff like logs
being pretty good at stopping arrows, and doesn't mention the unfixable parts
like "it'll burn" or "it'll tip over".

------
cvubrugier
For those living in or visiting Paris, you can see this application letter (or
a replica?) at the Pinacothèque de Paris until the end of the month.

------
neves
The funniest thing was that he got the job... to be a lyre player for Scorza:
[https://books.google.com.br/books?id=_WyYeJOelPMC&lpg=PT106&...](https://books.google.com.br/books?id=_WyYeJOelPMC&lpg=PT106&ots=Funs0hRxvu&dq=Ludovico%20Sforza%20leonardo%20da%20vinci%20lyre%20player&pg=PT106#v=onepage&q=Ludovico%20Sforza%20leonardo%20da%20vinci%20lyre%20player&f=false)

His engineering talents were ignored!

------
hathym
This one is a real 10x engineer

------
stared
I think that it is very alike current CVs/motivation letters. I mean, instead
of praising his fine arts accomplishments, he focused on mundane and practical
skills (even if dirty), but which are directly useful for his prospective
employer.

So, more in line of "I am good at Angular, but if there is a need, I can use
React", "I have experience in ad optimization and SEO", "I can optimize
predictive algorithms for stock prices, so they can have an edge over
competitors".

~~~
tmalsburg2
I agree about the mundane skills but I also have to say that this is a very
poor application letter because it only lists baseless claims. A good
application letter instead lists tangible accomplishments that substantiate
such claims. Ideally, the evidence for these accomplishments is so strong that
the claims do not even have to be made explicit.

------
talmand
I'd like an explanation of how he could demonstrate #5, silent construction of
tunnels, in the guy's park or area of choice in a reasonable fashion.

I would think a good challenge on that is to ask he demonstrate by
constructing a tunnel in secret that opens up in my current enemy's
fortification.

Of course, Leonardo could respond with "I don't tunnel for free!"

------
j45
Interesting that Leonardo, had to freelance and consult and invented and
innovated on the side just fine.

Sure, Leonardo Da Vinci syndrome can come to mind, maybe he was trying to get
the innovation out of him as quick as his teeming brain demanded.

------
peterjmag
Cracks me up that he mentions painting as little more than a side note. "Oh
yeah and I paint sometimes too." This from the guy who went on to create what
is arguably the most famous painting in the history of art.

------
edw519
Aaah, feels like a good time for me to recycle an oldie but goodie from #245
here:
[http://v25media.s3.amazonaws.com/edw519_mod.pdf](http://v25media.s3.amazonaws.com/edw519_mod.pdf)

If it worked for Leonardo da Vinci, maybe it could work for me. The next time
I’m looking for a job, I’ll try this:

“Most Illustrious Proprietor, Having now sufficiently considered the specimens
of all those who proclaim themselves skilled developers of applications of
business, and that the invention and operation of the said programs are
nothing different from those in common use: I shall endeavor, without
prejudice to any one else, to explain myself to your Company, showing your
Management my secret, and then offering them to your best pleasure and
approbation to work with effect at opportune moments on all those things
which, in part, shall be briefly noted below.

1\. I have a sort of extremely light and strong functions and modules, adapted
to be most easily ftp’d, and with them you may pursue, and at any time combine
them with others, secure and indestructible by standard mean time to failure
of hardware and denial of service, easy and convenient to compile and catalog.
Also methods of unzipping and storing the data of the customers.

2\. I know how, when a website is besieged, to shard data onto the cloud, and
make endless variety of mirrors, and fault tolerant disks and RAIDs, and other
machines pertaining to such concerns.

3\. If, by reason of the volume of the data, or the structure of the btrees
and its indexes, it is impossible, when conducting a search, to avail oneself
of sub-second response time, I have methods for benchmarking every process or
other function, even if it were interpreted, etc.

4\. Again, I have kinds of functions; most convenient and easy to ftp; and
with these I can spawn lots of data almost resembling a torrent; and with the
download of these cause great terror to the competitor, to his great detriment
and confusion.

5\. And if the processing should be on the desktop I have apps of many
machines most efficient for data entry and reporting; and utilities which will
satisfy the needs of the most demanding customers and users and consumers.

6\. I have means by secret and tortuous scripts and modules, made without
leaving tracks, to generate source code, even if it were needed to run on a
client or a server.

7\. I will make secure firewalls, safe and unattackable, which, entering among
the hackers with their utilities, there is no body of crackers so great but
they would break them. And behind these, software could run quite unhurt and
without any hindrance.

8\. In case of need I will make big properties, methods, and collections and
useful forms, out of the common type.

9\. Where the operation of compiling might fail, I would contrive scripts,
functions, routines, and other parameter driven processes of marvellous
efficacy and not in common use. And in short, according to the variety of
cases, I can contrive various and endless means of data entry, reporting, and
storage.

10\. In times of low revenue I believe I can give perfect satisfaction and to
the equal of any other in maintenance and the refactoring of code public and
private; and in guiding data from one warehouse to another.

11\. I can carry out code in Javascript, PHP, or C, and also I can do in
network administration whatever may be done, as well as any other, be he who
he may. Again, the intranet app may be taken in hand, which is to be to the
immortal glory and eternal honor of all your customers of happy memory, and of
the illustrious house of Google. And if any of the above-named things seem to
anyone to be impossible or not feasible, I am most ready to make the
experiment in your data center, or in whatever place may please your
Businessperson - to whom I comment myself with the utmost humility, etc.”

------
kelvin0
So Leonardo, could you please: "Write a program that prints the numbers from 1
to 100. But for multiples of three print “Fizz” instead of the number and for
the multiples of five print “Buzz”. For numbers which are multiples of both
three and five print “FizzBuzz”."

~~~
diezge
Leonardo: "Can I use jQuery?"

~~~
xrcltr
Actual Leonardo: "Why do you want this? I have found upon much observation and
reflection that those people of stout character who request Fizzbuzzium would
be far better served with the presentation of the solution to an alternative
problem that more closely describes the situation. Please find it within
yourself to return to first principles, so I may remove the original first
problem with quickness and zeal that you have not yet seen."

------
taytus
"I can do everything possible as well as any other, whosoever he may be." I
love this line.

------
MarvinYork
You need to specialize, Leo. Otherwise you'll never be good at something.

------
kolbe
Dear Leo: have you considered attending Stanford or MIT? You seem like an
intelligent candidate, but your lack of academic pedigree would be a real turn
off to our VC investors.

------
eternalban
Sure, come over Leo and we'll have a day long interview session. Btw, you will
be required to carve a statue over the weekend [without pay].

[edit]

~~~
notahacker
Or "That sounds fantastic Leonardo! As a well funded venture attempting to
disrupt the Mediterranean we're always looking for new team members and your
personal ambition is far more important than any previous experience. You'll
be able to work flexibly from our shiny new office palace, work directly with
our fantastic founders and we'll cover your lunch and gondola to work. And you
get to take a half day every second Friday. After your three month internship
we'll offer you fantastic references, and some of our former interns have been
offered full time work at a great below-market salary. Leo... you still
there?"

~~~
eternalban
It is getting completely ridiculous. What is specially galling is that these
days most of us have publicly published works (ala github, etc.)

On the other hand, seeing a letter like that reminded me of how James Joyce
[?] used to go to Shakespeare and Company [1] and rearrange the display to
make sure Ulysses was prominently displayed!

[?]: ?!!!

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare_and_Company_%28boo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare_and_Company_%28bookstore%29)

------
JoeAltmaier
Sounds like a geek who sketches wild ideas; then in his cover letter he
fantasizes that he actually knows how to do those things. I hope they took
those claims with a grain of salt!

------
jld89
It seems to me Leonardo that you don't have at least 15 years in any given
field. I'm sorry but I'm looking for a _senior_ engineer.

------
Mahn
Turn back now. There's no sensible discussion in this thread.

~~~
visakanv
All the bitterness in Hacker News is spilling out here. I suppose that's
probably a good thing.

------
scandox
"...shall please Your Excellency, to whom I commend myself with all possible
humility."

This is humility? Cool.

~~~
cevaris
My next cover letter will start with "Most Illustrious Lord". FTW.

~~~
mikro2nd
Because I lie (a lot!) to the Internets, IBM still have me (after 15-odd
years) on their mailing lists as "LORD X Foobar" (without verifying whether I
am actually entitled...)

