I'm with you on the "no serious technical questions" thing. It's a really bad sign.
However, it's also a really bad sign when all they seem to do is ask difficult technical questions. About a year ago, I went on an interview where I was asked to:
-create the dual of the primal (linear programming)
-calculate the long term state of a markov chain
-recursively and then iteratively traverse a binary tree
-code a singleton
-write a query that eliminates all dups (sql)
-find a way to rewrite a query as a set of binary indicators (wierd)
-find a way to swap two integers without creating a third integer
... and more stuff that I forget now
at the end of 7 hours of technical grilling, I knew nothing more about what this company's products actually did than I had gleaned from my own web research prior to the interview.
They didn't end up wanting me. But I can't say I really wanted them either. When this happens, I get the feeling that they're looking for, and probably getting, highly talented technical people, but I have doubts as to whether these programmers are actually innovating on the product itself, and that kind of creativity is very important to my enjoyment of a job.
However, it's also a really bad sign when all they seem to do is ask difficult technical questions. About a year ago, I went on an interview where I was asked to:
-create the dual of the primal (linear programming) -calculate the long term state of a markov chain -recursively and then iteratively traverse a binary tree -code a singleton -write a query that eliminates all dups (sql) -find a way to rewrite a query as a set of binary indicators (wierd) -find a way to swap two integers without creating a third integer ... and more stuff that I forget now
at the end of 7 hours of technical grilling, I knew nothing more about what this company's products actually did than I had gleaned from my own web research prior to the interview.
They didn't end up wanting me. But I can't say I really wanted them either. When this happens, I get the feeling that they're looking for, and probably getting, highly talented technical people, but I have doubts as to whether these programmers are actually innovating on the product itself, and that kind of creativity is very important to my enjoyment of a job.