I was contacted by a recruiter that Works as an HR partner of Altran. This person first sent me emails and then Whatsapp messages.
She then started forwarding me messages coming from the Hiring Manager in Altran THROUGH Whatsapp.
* Frontend Code Assessment: Build a frontend browsing app.
I quote one of the instructions of the list: “Use the framework you feel more comfortable using”. So i used VUE at that time.
I sent my clarifying questions list as I usually would do, but particularly these instructions were quite confusing, besides the fact we were speaking through a third person over Whatsapp messages. Answers never arrived.
They expected to have the test done within that week that was sent. I worked on my assumptions anyway and sent a fairly good Project with all requirements fulfilled.
Response was weird. They complimented my project as i my code was clean, structured it very well and added Unit and E2E tests (which they really liked). On the “negative” feedback, i got:
1) “It’s a very good Project, but it’s a Vue Project, not a React Project”
I followed the instructions on pdf “Use the framework you feel more comfortable using”
2) “We recommend mutations to modify state”
Of course i did that as it’s the way to use Vuex. On my Project there was no state change outside a mutation
3) “There is a hardcoded list that should not be hardcoded”
I hardcoded a list of types because I had no enough information (I specifically asked), I had no way to get that information beforehand, but as a workaround, i left (commented) an implementation. I have explained all that to them.
This guy said he wanted to see my REACT/REDUX level and also my NODE JS level
This person asked me to do first the Node JS task and then redo the same Frontend task in React. But NodeJS one first.
* Backend Test: Build a web API. They provided functional requirements, constraints and another API to get the source data.
Again instructions were kinda nuclear and, as it’s usual I sent my clarifying questions, politely asking them to reply this time. This guy sent a voice message to the third person (through Whatsapp) saying that “He had never been asked those questions before on his whole career”, so i didn’t know how to take that (is it good? Is it bad?).
I have done several interviews in my life and I know how picky people use to get (in my experience). So i always want to be crystal clear about everything and about what I’m going to do.
In this case, I had big questions about the instructions and requirements they sent as it was pretty nuclear, some requirements were overlapping, some of them had voids, what data should i return (was nuclear), also found erroneous data on the endpoint they sent. One of the recommendations said “use a database” and it was absolutely no need for a database whatsoever, where should I implement it anyway?
This guy looked down on all my questions, disregarded them and said something like “just keep it simple”, which was not an answer at all.
I did everything again with my assumptions, clarifying everything on the README and in the email i sent when i finished the task.
Feedback was:
1) "He didn’t care about eslint rules he set (he has 2 errors)"
These were my two eslint “errors”: 'no-extraneous-dependencies’ and 'padded-block'
2) "He returns booleans as strings"
What happened was that I left a route exposed from my Node JS boilerplate. Literally, this one:
app.get('/', (req, res) => {
res.status(200).send({
success: 'true',
message: 'Hello! :)',
});
});
Of course it’s my responsibility because i left it there! But does that deserve to be pointed as “He returns booleans as strings”?
3) "Wrong extra route being served"
That was absolutely right, i left an extra route (accessible only on development though, but anyway). Was a confusion while setting express when i replaced some file names and using my text editor tools, it might have escaped me.
He also said:
- “Since the beginning, I have noticed his (talking about me with this third person) lack of knowledge on the subject so I stopped reviewing his Project”
I understood that what he thinks (whether i agree or not) and that he might be extremely busy, but i took the time to complete this project as was asked as a part of the interview, so I do find extremely disrespectful that he didn’t finish revising my task
- “I would say he has very low REACT/REDUX experience and still has unclear concepts.
I guess i have been clear so far about this, but I NEVER gave them a React App, as I did the Vue one and then the Node one.
