This is a failing in job interviews in my view - selecting for skills that might not matter in practice. If you can build decent working code by Googling stuff as you go along (I know that approach works for me at least, besides the poster), there must be some real value to that which interviewers are missing.
It (usually) isn't a binary decision as to whether or not a candidate adds value to the company, but rather a decision on whether or not the candidate adds more value than the other candidates interviewed for the job. Given the choice between someone who can code sans-Google and someone who needs to constantly copy-paste from Stack Overflow, I'll take the guy or girl who can code on their own.
Of course, this doesn't mean I think programmers shouldn't use Google or Stack Overflow, I use them all the time. However, the specifics of what you're Googling matter a lot. If asked to implement a Red-Black Tree and you have to Google that to get an idea of what it is (or to refresh your memory) that's one thing, but if you have to Google basic loops or "FizzBuzz level" basic discreet logic constructs to implement simple code, then that's a huge problem.
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This is a failing in job interviews in my view - selecting for skills that might not matter in practice. If you can build decent working code by Googling stuff as you go along (I know that approach works for me at least, besides the poster), there must be some real value to that which interviewers are missing.
It (usually) isn't a binary decision as to whether or not a candidate adds value to the company, but rather a decision on whether or not the candidate adds more value than the other candidates interviewed for the job. Given the choice between someone who can code sans-Google and someone who needs to constantly copy-paste from Stack Overflow, I'll take the guy or girl who can code on their own.
Of course, this doesn't mean I think programmers shouldn't use Google or Stack Overflow, I use them all the time. However, the specifics of what you're Googling matter a lot. If asked to implement a Red-Black Tree and you have to Google that to get an idea of what it is (or to refresh your memory) that's one thing, but if you have to Google basic loops or "FizzBuzz level" basic discreet logic constructs to implement simple code, then that's a huge problem.