How can I become a Google engineer?

If Bian Xiao said that Google once hired a grassroots code farmer who didn't have a formal university degree or even an undergraduate degree, and basically relied on self-study, would everyone feel incredible? However, this is really possible-DavidByttow, a senior software engineer and entrepreneur who used to work for companies such as Google, Square and DoubleHelix, recently wrote an article introducing his experience from grassroots to being hired by Google. This story is absolutely inspiring!

First of all, summon up the courage to challenge the awesome things, and you will become awesome if you do it yourself.

Second, being friends with the industry can change the way of solving problems and looking at the world.

Third, diligence can make up for it, and make up for the gap in basic knowledge in a lot of practice.

Fourth, erase the academic qualifications in your resume and get an interview opportunity unexpectedly; Google interviews can be fun if you are well prepared. Facts have proved that Google is not completely subject to academic qualifications for outstanding talents.

Actually, I really want to go to college. I chose to apply for UCLA, but unfortunately, the GPA of high school is only 2.45, so I can't go to college. Then, I took a computer course in Gallemet campus of Purdue University, hoping to transfer smoothly or find another way out one day. After nearly two semesters, the way out came-I got an irresistible offer.

The first step: pretend to be awesome until I really become an awesome person. When I was in college, I worked in a small company in Griffith, Indiana. My job is to help local companies build websites, and the hourly salary is 12 USD. This job is far from my dream future career, but it's not too bad.

I worked hard, didn't talk big, and did several projects that exceeded expectations. This established a good reputation for me and made that company profitable. At the same time, I also try to develop games in my spare time. Later, I put all my eggs in one basket and asked the company management to give me three months and a little money to develop a game that can be sold online. I made beautiful spreadsheets and color charts to show them the principle of enjoying the software mode and the bright "money way" of the game. At that time, I didn't know what I was doing, but they still bought my account, probably because my products were beautiful in color.

After more than two months of development, I posted a demonstration on the Internet, which attracted the attention of California startup CodeFire, because they also made the same space shooting game, similar to non-3D subspace. But attracting attention is not necessarily a good thing-unfortunately, they sent me a notice to stop. So I can only answer, "No problem, I'll stop here-provided you hire me to develop your game." They offered me a job and I accepted it.

Note: Our company holds the original copyright of this game, and I informed my old club three weeks before I left my job.

Step 2: Make friends with Montana. This may be one of the most important things you can do-find Montana in your industry and make them your mentor. Remember that there is no end to learning. When I was working at DoubleHelix, I met NathanHunt, one of the smartest and most modest people I have ever met. He was very patient with all my questions, no matter how elementary they were. I walked into his office countless times and casually asked questions such as "how can I insert one rotation matrix into another smoothly?" Questions like this. A few years later, he joined Google a month later than me.

Each of my mentors has changed the way I solve problems or see the world to a certain extent, so I won't go into details here.

Step 3: Make up the gap I don't have a formal computer degree, so I know I lack a lot of basic knowledge. For example, I solved a dynamic programming problem with a physics engine, and the result was always unsuccessful. In order to fill these gaps, I practiced almost all the most common data structures and algorithms I have heard or read. You can certainly find the information you need, but there is a huge gap between "knowing what it is" through observation and "knowing why it is" through practice.

Over time, you need to do the following:

1. Proficient in at least one programming language of C, C++, Objective-C, Java, PHP, Python or Ruby, proficient in using at least one other language, and familiar with Scala, Haskell or Lisp.

2. Learn data structures, practice the most commonly used data structures, and understand their complexity.

3. Solve programming problems, see more, practice more and think more.

4. Build your own completed (unfinished) project portfolio (such as programming framework, mobile or Web application, mini-game, etc.). )

Step 4: Find Confidence Six years after I left Indiana, I have launched about six games on multiple platforms. I began to feel bored and needed to seek new challenges. I applied for the position of Google, thinking that being hired by Google would make me a "real engineer"-for a person without a paper diploma, this is my long-cherished ideal. However, I'm not surprised that I haven't heard from Google.

A year later, I resubmitted my resume, but this time I simply removed the "education" column. What makes people laugh and cry is that a recruiter actually called and arranged a technical telephone interview for me. I asked her if she could arrange a telephone interview in two weeks, and she agreed. I needed that time-I raced against time, filled my head with various algorithms and data structures to the maximum extent, and programmed 12 to 14 hours every day, and solved hundreds of programming problems. I was fascinated by it until my fear of Google interview turned into confidence and excitement.

I still remember everyone I met during the Google interview, and it was really pleasant to deal with them. The interviewer speaks humorously, and I believe they must have seen my excitement and expectation for the interview questions.

Here are some interview questions I encountered: 1) Give a set of two-dimensional points and calculate their skylines. This problem is very simple. There are several solutions. I use a common data structure called "maxheap".

3) Talk about the advantages of the software you value most. This is an "open" discussion interview. I talked about various tests and when they are valuable (such as unit, integration and acceptance), and also talked about a consistent style that is conducive to code maintainability and so on. These contents can be found in books such as CodeComplete and EffectiveJava.

I really enjoyed every round of interviews and answering all kinds of questions. If I hadn't come prepared, the situation would have been very different. I feel good about myself after the interview, but I heard that even if the recruitment Committee finally decides to issue an employment notice, it will only be effective if CEO Larry Page personally signs it. I'm worried that as soon as he sees that I don't have a degree, I'll be finished immediately.

However, such a tragedy did not happen after all-I received a phone call while eating sushi in Santa Clara at noon one day, and then I was ecstatic to accept the offer. From that day on, I finally decided that I never had to go back to school.

As Sun Tzu said, "Therefore, the victorious soldiers win first and then fight, and the defeated soldiers win first and then fight."

Note: I spent five wonderful years in Google, studying and growing as an engineer, but now I don't work in Google.