Potential employer asks to show previous code instead of detailed interview - how should we reply?

Question

Sorry if the question already has been discussed, I failed to find the discussion. And after all, this is friday. Feel free to close:). If the employer asks you to show your (any) previous production code without or before or instead of detailed interview with predefined tasks - how should we reply? of course it's not about confidentiality. But - is it relevant at all in context of future work?

UPD: I really doubt of this because of the next things:

1) real code is imperfect. it has a lot of limitations - working with another code and libs, deadlines, and you'll never say what is good and what is bad if you are not in the problem deeply.

2) code may seem perfect, but not absolutely yours:)

3) employer doesn't know what to ask according to future work.

Answer 1

Of course it's relevant. Nobody wants to hire anyone that writes unreadable garbage if they have a choice.

Answer 2

I'd like my new employer to ask me for my previous prod code. I'm better in coding than talking...

Answer 3

Sure, it's relevant. The quality of your code is very important. Especially if you have years of experience and only happened to write crappy code it will be very hard to convince you to write otherwise. The potential employer might be very unwilling to hire you then.

Answer 4

It'a good practice to ask future employee to write code during hiring interview. You should be prepared to that. It's a good way to know if you are confortable with the technology.

Moreover, the Joel test recommends it to software companies. As he says: "Would you hire a magician without asking them to show you some magic tricks? Of course not."

Answer 5

For an interviewer, a few lines of the actual code written by you that has been put to active use in a functional setup, can sometimes be worth scores of "correct jargon" and catch phrases during an interview. Sometimes it is hard to sift through spoken words to get to the real engineer beneath, while the code you write has its own way of communicating about you - your approach, style, standards and know-how at the very least methinks.

Answer 6

Business value is created somewhere between communication of business needs to the developer, the developer's understanding of the problem, and the subsequent code produced by the developer.

If we accept that, in the end, most of a developer's value is in the code the produce, then looking at previous code is a very good indication of the business value a developer will create -- which is the whole point of the evaluation.

Answer 7

All of your points are valid, but any good employer will know that any production code you supply will not be perfect. The code you supply should be the source of discussion, and I think that is the best way to find a good person for a given role.

If you walk into the interview, and the potential employer lambasts you for the code not being perfect then walk away!

Answer 8

I would say "the code I produced for previous employers belongs to them; it is not mine to share. If hired I would treat the code I develop for you in the same manner".

I would then point them to open source code I've been a part of, but that only works if you've actually worked on significant open source software.

Answer 9

I always bring a code sample of production code to an interview. It may have to be scrubbed for proprietary reasons. And nothing stops you from improving the code to what you would have done if you had neen allowed to, it's not like they are going to see the rest of the code base. Plus if you think about this and pick out a good example before you start interviewing, you can pick the code you are most proud of which hopefully wil be pretty impresive all on it's own.

I offer this code to the interview if he or she doesn't ask for it. I also make sure he or she knows that I have changed anything proprietary out of it. This accomplishes two things, first it shows that I am conmfident that my code was good enough to show others and second, it shows I will protect their proprietary data.