Is anyone else like me, in that you become bored of programming the actual game, and prefer to write the lower level engine components?

My interview isn't exactly what you would consider hard. This was at small business, and the CTO asked me 10 or fewer questions. These questions included:
What is an identity matrix?
What is a shader?
What are the 3 protection levels in C++?
and a few other questions along the same lines. I got the job.

Ok, so there is more to it. The CEO teaches 3D animation programming class at the university I attended, and was impressed with my work, so over the summer asked if I wanted to intern at his company. In this case, the class was essentially the interview process. I'm assuming the questions were just to make sure that I wasn't just faking it the whole time, but it cracks me up nonetheless. Excluding our CTO, all but one of our current programmers have been personally scouted by our boss from the university, and most have taken his class.

Since then, we have hired a programmer who wasn't scouted from school. For that interview process, we essentially ganged up on the interviewee, where we had 3 or 4 people in the room asking questions. After interviewing a few people, we sat down and formalized a list questions that we thought would ensure that they had good knowledge of C++, some basic object oriented concepts, data structures, vector math, and other import concepts. We also tried to see what areas people were strong in, such as graphics, networking, physics, etc., and tried to make sure that they actually knew the basics of the fields they ranked themselves well in. After using this method, we have been very happy with the person we chose.

I'd like to touch on a point that is often looked over by young developers:
* Excellent oral and written communication skills.

This is ABSOLUTELY crucial when working with other developers. This encompasses:
* The abilities to get your ideas across, with as little confusion as possible.
* Technical designs that make sense
* Ability to break bad news
* The ability to spread good news

The most brilliant developer in the world, who can't mumble or mutter his way through explaining why we should use one system over another, is near useless to a producer who needs answers, or fellow coders who don't understand his code.


As a side note, my fellow programmers at Timegate still joke about my magic trick of conjuring grapes in the middle of the interview. Nobody knows how I did it, and still makes them chuckle.

skyhawk Wrote:I'd like to touch on a point that is often looked over by young developers:
* Excellent oral and written communication skills.

This is ABSOLUTELY crucial when working with other developers. This encompasses:
* The abilities to get your ideas across, with as little confusion as possible.
* Technical designs that make sense
* Ability to break bad news
* The ability to spread good news

The most brilliant developer in the world, who can't mumble or mutter his way through explaining why we should use one system over another, is near useless to a producer who needs answers, or fellow coders who don't understand his code.


As a side note, my fellow programmers at Timegate still joke about my magic trick of conjuring grapes in the middle of the interview. Nobody knows how I did it, and still makes them chuckle.

I think one of the best ways to develop strong written communication skills is to be active in forums (like this) and mailing lists. You learn to write terse, precise, and relevant stuff.

I completely agree with the communications skills necessity. I also agree with cmiller about hanging around places like this to help sharpen those skills. Blabbing with folks here has definitely helped improve my written communication, but also some of my verbal communication. I would add that hanging around forums also helps develop skills in dealing with others' attitudes and opinions, which can be significantly more challenging than simply writing down what you want to say.

Me too posting here much help much better words than i used to.