A DevOps Coding Challenge

You might be reading this title and like me thinking "How is this a thing?". After talking to the company and asking clarifying questions I felt ok about it. A week ago I did the challenge and I just wanted to give my thoughts on it.

TLDR: I actually thought this was a great idea upon hearing what to expect and completing it.

Ok let me back up to the rules. 4hours to take a coding challenge on an online platform. I took the practice test and it was some crazy db stuff and I was just like "Is this a joke God??" (I'll explain later), but honestly once the test started it was nothing like that. I was told form the start that the test was more so of a "prove you have the skills we are talking about" thing. Pretty fair if you ask me since I hear a lot of stories about people having certs but no actual experience. I myself feel like that when it comes to k8s that's why I'm very honest about my lack of hands on there.

Anyway so I start the test and there are some multiple choice questions and some hands on questions. Multiple choice wasn't too bad. Almost behavioral in a sense. The hands on was my absolute favorite! I can sometimes get into the weeds on things when they don't work the first time. This was no different honestly.

My favorite part about the hands on stuff is that I got to use some new linux skills I learned form work (S/O to my coworkers). I also found that even though I say I don't have any k8s experience I actually do. I wasn't stumped at what any of the words meant or what they were asking me to do. I've worked with containers in some capacity since I switched to devops and this felt like me putting the pieces together.

All in all I really liked the experience and I didn't need 4hrs. I don't think the time thing was a test within a test either. It was one of those test you had to do in one setting so if you have kids or something that's probably really helpful. Lastly my keyboard died half way through the test and I've never been more stressed about getting back to 10%. lol