Was contacted by a recruiter via email. Initially was given a phone interview with some extremely basic questions that were likely gauging whether I was at least a basically qualified candidate and worth pushing further into the interview pipeline. The recruiter was non-technical, so she was likely just expecting to hear a few key words from the job description, like 'Linux' and 'Python'. The recruiter offered me a coding challenge that would take a "couple of hours". Turns out the coding challenge is writing a whole 'Beer Manager' API with a 2 page list of specifications. If you have ever done backend web development that involves database work, this was really not difficult, just very time consuming. The requirement was to use Python and implement a set of features. This was my first time using Python in a web development setting (I had used it academically plenty of times), so I treated it as a learning experience. Writing the API took most of a weekend. I submitted it and and a couple of hours later the non-technical recruiter invited me to an on-site interview. I accepted. Now, I should mention that I am still currently a university student that will graduate in a few months. I live a couple of hours from the city in question. I had to drive to the city specifically for the on-site interview. The on-site interview was with the technical lead. There were no questions that required actual problem solving or computation. Most were related to Python, asking "have you ever used Python to do _____" or "tell me about your web development experience". The interview did not say a single word about the Beer Manager API I spent 8-12 hours on. No comments or feedback about it whatsoever. Ultimately the interviewer asked me absolutely nothing that couldn't have been asked over the phone. The interview lasted less than an hour. About a week later, I got an email from the non-technical recruiter saying they had found a better candidate for the job. No further explanation. My biggest gripe with the hiring process: Traveling to the city was a waste of time and money for me. I was not compensated and had to pay out of pocket to travel there. The on-site interview was nothing that could not have been asked over the phone. I was given no feedback about the project I spent time working on. All in all, a spectacular waste of time on my part.

After applying, I was contacted by their HR representative. I was given a programming assignment that involved developing a REST web service. There were detailed requirements about how the service should function, and how it should be documented. I was told to complete the assignment and send it in to the HR department who would then forward it on the the hiring manager. After sending in the program, I was brought in for an interview. The interview consisted only of meeting with the hiring manager. I wasn't asked any programming questions in the interview. I was asked how I would go about improving performance and scalability of a system. There was no feed back about the programming assignment other than that they were impressed, and the documentation and instructions for running it were very well written. I'm skeptical that the code was actually checked for correctness or completeness. Overall, this was a very informal interview, and it didn't seem like there was really any formal process that was followed so the format could change depending on the hiring manager. There was no HR interview besides the initial phone conversation about the programming assignment, and no other managers in the interview. I was told I'd hear from the team soon with a decision, and I felt very good about the prospect of getting an offer I called in a week or so later to check in, and was told that the hiring manager thought it was going to take too long for me to get up to speed. This was a shock as this did not come up in the interview at all. The hiring manager seemed to be impressed with my programming assignment solution, so I'm not sure what caused this concern.