The day has come. You passed the initial phone interview with the recruiter and now you finally arrived at the technical interview. Technical interviews can either be very easy or very hard. You might get lucky and the prospective company you want to work at just asks for sample code or you might be walking into a grill session and you’re on the menu today.

Here is a list of topics you should know in depth to land a job as a web developer.

MYSQL Table Joins

You should know what’s the difference between a left join and a right join. What’s the difference between an inner join, a cross join, an outer join. It’s also a good idea to know when to use a join versus a subquery. Look at Jeff Atwood’s explanation of joins.

OOP Principles

The questions that tech companies love to ask on technical interviews are about polymorphism, class abstraction, interfaces, and class inheritance. Some common questions are:

• What is an abstract class and why would I use one?
• What is the difference between an abstract class and an interface?
• Why would I use an abstract class versus an interface?
• What are some common architectural design patterns?
• What is a factory?
• What is a singleton?
• What is encapsulation?
• What in the most simplest explanation is polymorphism?

Performance/Scaling

Even if you haven’t done any work in your career optimizing performance on a web/mobile application you should know and research the following key areas. Questions around these key areas may be asked:

• I have a slow website, how would I diagnose if the slowness is coming from the front end or the back end?
• When should a JPEG be used versus a PNG?
• When should data be retrieved in real time versus versus cached either in a database or a caching platform such as memcache?
• Why is it not a good idea to use inline css or javascript? Generally speaking its not a good idea to use inline css or javascript because the browser won’t be able to cache your javascript files and will have to reload them every time a user loads a webpage.
• What tools can I use to determine how long a page is running?
• How can I benchmark SQL queries on an application to see whats being run and how long each query takes?

Common algorithm problems

• How would I sort through a multidimensional array?
• How would I find a value in a multidimensional array in the fastest amount of time possible?
• How would I iterate through a data set and paginate it on an HTML page?
• How do I quickly iterate through a file system and find out if a file or file with a pattern exists?

Regular expressions (Regex)

• When is it not a good idea to use a regex? Generally speaking you shouldn’t use a regex as a main defense against email forgery. You should use an email regex plus email confirmation to ensure that email addresses entered within your database are actual emails.
• How do I write a regex that targets alphanumeric characters?
• How do I write a regex that targets alphanumeric characters plus whitespace and new lines?
• How do I write a regex that matches words plus numeric characters?

Versioning and source control

• What is git?
• Why would you choose git over SVN?
• What’s the difference between a branch and a tag?
• Are you familiar with git flow? Why would you use git flow?

General programming knowledge

• What are the different data types for (x language = the language you claim to have knowledge in).
• What’s the difference between an increment operator and a decrement operator?
• What are the different type of loops that are available in (x language)?
• What function would you use to sort an array or sort an object?

If you can think of any additional questions that you encountered on a technical interview please leave them in the comments. We’ll add them to the list. Thanks!

So you got the call.  Congratulations!  Your interview is scheduled, and you officially have your foot in the door.  Don’t get cocky, as a freelance developer you must prepare yourself not only to successfully complete the interview, but to answer some tough questions and even possibly quell some potentially harmful stereotypes that still exist in the workplace today about freelancers and their ability to join or rejoin a traditional workplace.

Don’t wear a sticker on your forehead proclaiming not to be a commitment-phobe.

Instead, walk into the interview prepared for the fact that many businesses and even HR managers have concerns about freelance developers (especially longer-term freelancers) who suddenly decide to enter the traditional workforce.  Acknowledging this empowers you with the ability to explain your position, your motivations, and your enthusiasm for entering the traditional workplace.

Transparency is your best defense here.  Explain what set of circumstances led you to pursue freelancing.  Whether you’re a recent grad who wanted to get some experience under their belt or you lost your job due to downsizing or outsourcing and chose to freelance rather than collect an unemployment check…explain what lead to the decision to freelance and also, the reasons you wish to return to the workplace.

Again, be specific here…and honest.  If freelancing just didn’t work for you, explain that you prefer a more structured environment such as an office and the freedom to focus on what you enjoy doing (programming) without having to concern yourself with running your own business.  Or, perhaps, you have a family and the prospect of a regular income and benefits are more attractive and a better fit for your lifestyle than the freelancing world.

Whatever the case, make sure that you express that your interest in rejoining the workforce is sincere and that you genuinely want to move back into a corporate or small businesslike environment.

Play well with others.

Another common misconception about freelance developers is that they are not team players.  It is your responsibility during your interview to ensure that the person interviewing you understands that not only do you want to become a part of their team, but you have the social aptitude to function successfully as a part of their organization.  Turn the negative into a positive here by pointing out for-instances where you blended into an organization as a freelancer and were able to provide key insights and contributions that lead to the success of the group as a whole, as opposed to focusing on the success of ‘your project’.

Close the interview with emphasis on your commitment to the employer.

When it is all said and done, if your talent and work history is a good match for the position, getting hired is simply a matter of effectively demonstrating your commitment to the company and its goals.

Ask questions during the interview that demonstrate your interest in company strategy, culture, and vision.  This tells the interviewer that you are not merely seeking employment or an escape from freelancing, but searching for a position where your personality, talent, and future fits in and allows you to invest yourself, growing with the company and its future.

Whether you turned to freelancing as a newbie looking to get some credentials under your belt or you’re a seasoned pro who lost your foothold in your last fulltime gig thanks to downsizing or outsourcing…if you have made the decision to jump back into fulltime employment, you’re in luck: the stigmatism that once plagued the freelance community has lifted dramatically over the past five years, however, there’s some things you need to know that will ensure you get your foot back in the door…

Invest your time in a good resume (and good does not necessarily mean long).

Begin this process with the knowledge that many companies and HR associates have a learning curve when it comes interpreting and assessing the resume of a freelancer. Taking the time to adapt your work experience to fit into the traditional resume format can be a painstaking, yet rewarding process.

Obviously, you won’t be able to fit several years of freelancing experience detailing each project as if it were an actual job. Instead, try creating an outline of your most challenging projects that showcase your specific talents and achievements that you feel would be of most interest to your potential employer.

If you are concerned that this list comes up short in comparison to a traditional work history, try interjecting short dialogues in-between the major projects that remind the reader that during the specific projects you have chosen to detail, you were busy doing other, smaller jobs as well. Make sure to focus on technologies, languages, and frameworks that you worked with on a regular basis in these sections, taking advantage of the opportunity to establish expertise and solid experience.

When you feel like you have sufficiently shown your work history (without going overboard), make a list of three long-term clients that you are confident will give you glowing recommendations. Always contact these clients prior to using them as references and always ask their permission. This way, they can be prepared for any phone calls and subsequent questions.

Last, but certainly not least in the resume department, make sure you give your potential employer a thorough glimpse of your educational background, highlighting any relevant certifications. If you lack the degree or higher education background that many of your peers possess, consider investing in a certification program that compliments your programming skills. Doing this assures potential employers that your knowledge and ability levels in that particular area are up to par with your peers.

Exhaust your existing resources before you hit up Monster, Craigslist, or Career Builder.

Before you begin blindly putting in resumes, make a few phone calls to clients you have established relationships with as a freelancer. They had a need for your services in the past and they know firsthand your capabilities, work ethic, and performance levels. Chances are, if they have need for your services on a fulltime basis, they will likely consider giving you the position rather than spending the time and resources to attract, interview, and select a programmer with whom they have no experience working with.

Don’t stop there! Keep an open dialogue with all your clients, making them aware of your intention to return to fulltime employment. Don’t be shy…ask questions regarding any potential leads they can offer or recommendations they can make to colleagues.

When submitting resumes, focus on quality, not quantity.

Forget submitting resumes by the hundreds, as tempting as it may be, and focus instead on thoroughly reading job descriptions and only submitting resumes to the jobs that align most clearly with your skill set and ideal workplace. Once you identify a good match, take your time and cater your cover letter to that individual submission. Overtly form-letter like cover letters are a huge turn off to potential employers. Remember, first impressions count and the content of your cover letter largely determines whether or not your resume is even reviewed.

Imagine your an employer sitting in your office on a Monday morning. Your browsing through all of your emails that came in over the weekend and you see a few candidates have sent you their resume. You take a look at their PDF resume and notice that they’re certified. When we at Headhuntable asked several tech companies if certification matters to them, the majority of them answered “No but it catches your attention” and the remaining percentage answered “Yes”.  Because we’re in an industry that’s all about what you built and not about how much schooling you have or certifications you have taken; a certification may get you into the interview but may not guarantee a job.

There are some great benefits to getting certified though. The most obvious benefit of a certificate in computer programming languages is the edge it can give you in the job market because when you study, appear and succeed in any certification, you not only get yourself acquainted with lots of important theoretical concepts but you also become well versed with practical side of the technology. Lots of employers, when short listing candidates for interviews, give due importance to those resumes with the name of a reputed certification program imprinted in them. But apart from taking you ahead in your career, these tests can also be a useful tool for you to test yourself, whether a career as a software programmer would really suite you or not?

There are lots of popular certification programs like Java Certified Programmer, Oracle certified programmer and plethora of them being offered by Microsoft, which have been around for quite some time. PHP and Ruby on rails are relatively new programming languages and so are the certification programs associated with these languages.

In case of PHP, there are two popular certification programs,

PHP Developer Certificate by w3schools
Zend PHP Certification

PHP Developer Certificate expects you to have a firm grasp over fundamentals of PHP and MySQL. In order to help prepare for this exam, w3schools have created a free online training program, which can be accessed through following links,

http://www.w3schools.com/php/default.asp

http://www.w3schools.com/sql/default.asp

Cost of taking this certification test is 95 US$, you can pay and start with the test by following this link,

http://www.w3schools.com/cert/cert_php_reg.asp

Zend PHP Certification is the most reputed and recognized PHP certification program. Zend offers its certification test programs through 3 packages. All the three packages carry different price tags depending upon the training program they offer along with the certification test voucher,

Zend PHP 5.3 Certification Money Saving Bundle: 534.77 US$

Zend PHP 5.3 Certification Exam Voucher: 125 US$

Test Prep for the PHP 5.3 Certification Exam + Test Voucher: 1000 US$

I highly recommend taking the training course/test prep. The Zend test has hidden tricks and traps that you should know about. Those who are sure of themselves and do not want any training can opt for the Zend PHP 5.3 Certification Exam Voucher.

As far as Ruby on Rails is concerned, certification programs are still in the nascent stage. The most developed and evolved certification program in this programming language is Ruby Association Certified Ruby Programmer Silver. Cost of undertaking this test is 150 US$.

But remember the certification alone will not get you the job. It may give you better chances at scoring an interview. Wouldn’t it be great if you could take one certification test that’s standard across the board so you never have to take technical tests on interviews?

Tech companies and recruiters, do you give much merit to a developer who’s certified? Please feel free to comment below and let us know if certifications really matter to you.

Working from home is great. Lets face it, sitting in your backyard on a nice summer day with your laptop writing code is amazing but many employers won’t let you work at home  right off the bat. You usually have to try and negotiate working from home into your job offer from the start if you want to start working from home after accepting a new job. Here are a few ways that if you follow can help you convince your employer to allow you to write code from home.

Work while your sick from home

If you have a bad cold or some other sickness that would have prevented you from working in the office then work from home. It may not be an ideal situation to work while your sick but if you show your employer that you can work from home and be productive they will be much more understanding.

Offer to work from home when you have a doctors appointment

Rather than taking the day off and losing a day of work, offer your employer the opportunity to let you work from home when you need to go to the doctor. Remember working from home with a company that doesn’t allow it is all about baby steps. You take small steps to ease into it so that when you want to start working from home more regularly you have some footing to stand on.

Offer to do your overtime from home

If your in crunch time and your employer needs you to work overtime to make the deadline offer the ability of working from home as an incentive to ensure that you will make the deadline. In most environments employers care more about meeting a strict and/or impossible deadline to please a client or upper management. If you give them the ability to make their deadline they might let you work from home. It’s a win-win.

When working from home always be on skype

One of the main reasons employers don’t like employees working from home is because of lack of communication. If while working from home your employer cannot reach you through skype and/or you are slow to respond to emails it will give your employer the impression that you are not being productive. If you keep your skype signed online and answer it whenever management sends you a skype message they will see you as being connected with the team and productive.

Don’t abuse the priviledge

If your finally in a good place at your job where they let you work from home, don’t abuse it. Don’t ask to work from home each week and definitely do not ask to work from home on a day when you have meetings. Instead of asking every week, ask once a month. If you ask too often you risk your employer noticing that your not in the office that much and they might take away the privilege.

Ever seen a red button that says “Don’t Press” and you probably ended up pressing it right? Human curiosity is a funny thing; if you tell people there is a purple elephant dancing in a room but don’t look and you will get a thousand dollars the majority of people will still look. Here are five things that you don’t want to do while working as a developer (freelancer or full timer).

Being cocky

Confidence is one thing and cockiness is another. People generally don’t like cockiness especially in the work place. If your confident in your abilities don’t brag about your abilities just acknowledge that you have the know how to get the job done but there are still things you need to learn. By showing others that there are things that you still don’t know you will show that your confident and humble. In addition to your coworkers not liking you if your cocky you have to always be on the top of your game. You can’t set the bar high and not follow through.

Not willing to learn new technologies

If a client or employer asks you to learn a new technology to build a product you should. Learning new technologies is actually a blessing in disguise. The more technologies you know increases your chances of getting a raise come employee review time. In addition being paid to learn is amazing. Usually you have to learn on your own during weekends or evenings. If you have an employer that is willing to let you do learning during office hours you are very lucky. If your a PHP or Ruby developer and you have the opportunity to learn Objective C, go for it. You might start learning Objective C and then love mobile development and switch careers. The mobile development market is really blowing up right now; there is an extreme demand for mobile developers.

Leaving a project at the wrong time

If your currently working on a project thats in its final stages (testing and QA) this is the wrong time to leave a project. Usually projects where the lead programmer leaves the project during testing and QA take twice as long to launch. The reason being is that you have to bring in a new person, teach them the software and processes. If your going to leave a project in its final stages then provide sufficient documentation so that the learning curve for the next developer will be shorter. It’s also a good idea to tell your client that you will answer any questions the next developer may have and provide limited support so that the transition process isn’t an uphill battle. Remember burning your bridges will only leave you with less opportunities in the future.

Not communicating properly

The one thing that clients and employers treasure and this is true in all relationships is communication. If your going to miss a deadline, tell your client before hand and tell them why your going to miss the deadline. Don’t leave your client in the dark, give your client ample notice to let them know your going to miss it. By showing common courtesy and letting them know your running a little late they will still trust you. Trust is paramount in any relationship, even in business. Without trust in your abilities to get the job done your client will stray and start looking for another developer.

Underestimating your work

The hardest task for any developer is figuring out how long something is going to take. Especially since a bug may arise that will make you burn through hours. Whenever you give a client an estimate don’t cut yourself short. Provide some padding to your estimate, usually the best padding to provide to an estimate is 15 – 25%. Calculate how many hours each task within the development task will take you to build, sum up all the hours and add 15-25% on top of that to account for bugs that come up through QA and revisions. By applying some padding to your estimate you can account for some revision requests the client may have and any unforeseen bugs. The ultimate client → freelancer or employee → employer relationship killer is not being able to estimate tasks effectively. Clients and employers will never ask you “Are you sure?” when your sending them a low estimate. It’s your job to estimate it correctly because everyone wants to get everything at a great deal. If they really like your work and your estimate comes through as lower than they were expecting to pay most clients will not ask why its low they will think they’re getting a great deal. When the project comes to a close and you ask for additional payment because you underestimated the work they might give you some issues.

Follow me on twitter at @nathanhuntable

As you may have know we launched a couple of months ago in beta and have been slowly building our link presence online. SEO has been a true learning experience for us and in some ways is downright frightening. Here are a few of the issues in the SEO market that we noticed that are keeping all of us at Headhuntable up at night.

Fiverr

We tried Fiverr for a little with some link building efforts but we mostly notice they are garbage links. For example here is one that we came upon recently. “I will create 18,000 links from 6000 wiki sites”. How is that people think these links are of any use? Fiverr is good for press release submission though. If your going to distribute your press release I highly advise you use this gig. For inexperienced link builders there should be warning labels on certain gigs on Fiverr that tell you they can potentially ruin your rankings.

Top SEO companies that charge a lot and provide little link value

I was on the phone with a company a month ago that is supposedly very experienced in their market and I asked the representative, “Will I see any traffic coming from your links?”. He replied “Most of our links are hidden, you won’t see them so there won’t be any traffic coming from them.”  If I won’t see them how will Google see them? If you hear this sort of answer you should not hire this company. Links that provide good value are links where traffic comes through and are placed well on authority websites.

The alarming amount of people who “guarantee” front page placement

If you visit the top marketing forum, Warrior Forums you will see this forum discussion group where many members guarantee front page placement. It’s true that it can come from hard work and time but to guarantee it within 1 month is just silly. I feel really bad for first timers who see this, get excited, and decide to start paying $300 a month because they think after one or two months they will be ranking on the front page. They should invest that $300 in high quality content and promote the content using various social bookmarking sites. Instead of marketers guaranteeing front page placement within x amount of months they should guarantee that you will get there as long as you hire us to do your marketing.

The amount of bad content out there

Welcome to the age of the $5 article writer or even the $1 article writer. If you go to sites like odesk.com, freelancer.com, you will see scores of writers who claim quality for $5 an article. Many webmaster’s seem to think that if you keep writing and spinning content you can achieve high rankings and stay there. Why not just take a writing class and start writing yourself? Anything that you write will probably be better than paying for $5 content.

How many dollars are burned on bad SEO products

If your going to hire someone else to do SEO you can pay anything from $200 a month to $10,000 a month. $200 a month can buy you outsourced probably automated link building while $10,000 a month can probably get you on the front page of many authority websites. I have yet to find the middle ground where I am paying for quality and not paying an arm and a leg because the SEO company manages a well known client (and I’m paying for their track record). I would like to think that there are companies out there that provide quality at affordable prices for a lean bootstrapped startup.

How many blogs/forums are no follow now

I understand that blogs are no follow (with their commenting) due to blog spam but what about comments that are generally helpful or contribute something useful to the article? I feel that if your commenting and saying something that can help others the link should be made into do follow. Do follow links are a great incentive for people who don’t usually comment to start commenting.

If you have any ideas or opinions on what scares you about SEO, please do let me know and I’ll add it to this blog post. You can reach me at @nathanhuntable on twitter or comment on this post directly.

Thanks and stay tuned for my next post!

Being a developer can be a very rewarding job but can also be a very challenging job depending on how you look at the glass; either half empty or half full. Here are a few facts that you will need to accept if you want to be successful in your career as a developer.

You’re probably going to have to take tests every time you want a job

If your not a good test taker or even a nervous test taker you will need to brush up on your test taking skills. Most companies are now making their developer candidates take many series of tests before they consider them for a position. Every time you leave a job and start a new one expect to take a technical test. A technical test can be anything from building a new piece of functionality from scratch to answering questions that test intelligence or problem solving skills. Sites like interviewstreet.com are used by top tech companies to help leverage and assess a candidates knowledge. Check out interviewstreet.com and take some challenges in your spare time to get up to speed.

You might have to work a lot of overtime

Developers on average work more than 8 hours per day. This is just the nature of software development. Bugs arise that prevent you from rolling out a feature and you may have to stay late to finish fixing whatever bug that may arise. If your going to do overtime find a company that gives you perks for overtime or perhaps even cash. You will need to find this out on your job interview and negotiate this into your offer letter. If they want you to work for them they will want to make you happy with their overtime policy.

Whatever you know now may be obsolete in 5 years

Technology is forever changing. Companies are finding faster and better ways to get things done and they want to use the latest technologies. If you currently mastered a language or technology you should start learning in your free time a new technology that is up and coming so that you will be already ahead of the game. Remember the more you know the more you get paid. Don’t you wish learning was as easy as it was in the matrix?

You can make a lot of money

In development there are two paths you can go. You can go the consulting route which does have a max cap of how much you can get paid or you can build a product in your spare time, market it, promote it and become very rich (hopefully). Right now the most sought after skills in technology are within the development sphere. If you know how to develop great products team up with a designer and build a hobby project. Your hobby project may be your ticket to you sitting on a beach with a pina colada in hand (or whatever cocktail you love).

You’ll never go hungry again

Because software development is a field that is constantly changing and always in demand you will always be able to find a new job or project. Other fields that stay the same or require no additional learning can be replaced by technology but if your in a field that keeps growing you can rest assured you will always find a job.

You’ll work hard but play even harder

Many tech companies now a days are having “hackathons”. Hackathons are basically all night or all day coding sessions which include prizes (for the best coders) and amazing drinks/food. In addition to hackathons many companies such as google are providing amenities such as massages, free meals, free games, activities and much more. Many developers also don’t work in cubicles and don’t have to dress up in a suit or even slacks for work. Companies feel that for developers to code the best they have to be in a comfortable environment where they can feel at home.

Follow me on twitter at @nathanhuntable.

I’ve worked in many tech environments; environments with no deadlines, environments with deadlines and I’ve come to the conclusion that deadlines can help and hurt your business depending on how you use them. Typically there are a few ways that can give deadlines and still have happy workers and some bad ways of giving deadlines and getting disgruntled staff.

If your giving a deadline, give enough time

If your deadlines are always “this was needed yesterday” and never have any room for breathing your setting yourself up for disappointment. Great work is never produced in a stressful environment, if your staff feels like they have to pull an all nighter just to get the job done and they constantly work overtime you have two choices, give perks or accept high turnover in your development team. Companies like Google and Facebook realize that the work week just doesn’t have enough hours and rather than make their employees slave away they provide extra perks such as free food, onsite services such as massage and great recreational areas. You want to make your employees feel like their at their second home so you will have staff who will work overtime and not get disgruntled at the company. Try offering snacks, free pizza on Fridays, a little appreciation can go a long way.

Have the developers set their own deadlines not management

Many managers don’t know how much time a certain task will take and decide to set a deadline without knowing all the facts. Have your managers speak with your developers and ask them how many hours each task within the project will take. After you gather their input work with them to make a deadline that works. If you set a deadline of 10 hours and it actually takes 25 hours then you will be disappointed when it doesn’t take 10 hours and even more disappointed when you have a buggy product because your developer didn’t spend enough time working on it/testing it.

Ask your developers to find shortcuts to get the job done

If your trying to meet a tight development schedule and you really need to meet a deadline to impress a client, ask your developer to research and suggest some other ways to get the job done. There are tons of plugins and open source products available for you to use. Don’t reinvent the wheel, use Jquery.

Don’t micromanage your staff when they’re on a deadline

Remember your dad or mom getting angry at you when you asked “Are we there yet?” over and over on a car trip. The best way to keep your staff happy is to set a deadline and then set a time period every few days to check status. I remember one time where I had a manager who checked every morning and at the end of the day the status of my work. In this situation I could either impress him or disappoint him which is not something I wanted to do. Many things in programming often take longer than usual especially when your dealing with third party open source bugs. If you check on your developers progress every day and he or she has nothing to show you then you might think to yourself what we’re they doing all day when infact they could have been working all day but stuck battling a nasty bug.

Give incentives for meeting tough deadlines

You don’t have to give cash incentives, maybe give a day off or a half day on a Friday. A small gesture goes a long way with developers. Developers like to hang out on beaches or have some couch time too you know, we can’t breathe and dream code all the time.. just most of the time.

We made two major updates to the site tonight. With this update includes the ability to have a visual portfolio. Just send your Headhuntable link to any potential employer as your resume!

1. Adding work experience is much more easier, all you have to do now is add the name of each project, the URL, select how much code you wrote and enter what you did on the project. Once you add a new project, in a couple of hours your project will be spidered and a screenshot will be taken. We take a snap of the project and attach it to your headhuntable profile. Please go to http://www.headhuntable.com/developers/editwork to edit your work experience.
2. Everyone gets a much sexier, sleek work experience section now. Please checkout Nathan Hallford’s profile (the founder of Headhuntable). We thought a nice visual representation of your portfolio is much better than a boring work experience list.

Want to get a profile like this? Just sign up on Headhuntable or login