Hiring guide for Elixir Radar Engineers

Elixir Radar Developer Hiring Guide

Elixir Radar is a programming language software that leverages the robustness and concurrency of Erlang while also providing friendly syntax similar to Ruby. It was developed by José Valim, an active member of the Ruby community, who wanted to create a language optimized for maintainability and high productivity rates. The Elixir Radar program makes use of the BEAM virtual machine, which has been proven in developing scalable systems with low latency over decades. This software promotes concurrent programming through its inherent features like lightweight process creation and message passing capabilities for communication between processes. Its functional nature encourages developers to write clear code that is easy-to-test thereby enhancing system reliability.

Ask the right questions secure the right Elixir Radar talent among an increasingly shrinking pool of talent.

First 20 minutes

General Elixir Radar app knowledge and experience

The first 20 minutes of the interview should seek to understand the candidate's general background in Elixir Radar application development, including their experience with various programming languages, databases, and their approach to designing scalable and maintainable systems.

What is the main use of Elixir in software development?
Elixir is mainly used in developing scalable and maintainable applications. It leverages the Erlang VM, known for running low-latency, distributed, and fault-tolerant systems.
How would you install Elixir in your local machine?
You can install Elixir using package managers for various systems. For example, on macOS, you can use Homebrew and run 'brew install elixir'.
What are some key features of Elixir that make it a unique programming language?
Key features of Elixir include its functional programming style, concurrency, fault tolerance, scalability, and the ability to build real-time distributed systems.
How would you create a new project in Elixir?
To create a new project in Elixir, you can use the 'mix' command. For example, 'mix new project_name' will create a new project with the specified name.
Describe the difference between '==' and '===' in Elixir.
'==' is a comparison operator that checks if the values of two operands are equal or not. '===' also checks the types of operands in addition to their values.
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What you’re looking for early on

Does the candidate have a solid understanding of Elixir?
Can the candidate effectively communicate their thoughts and ideas?
Has the candidate demonstrated problem-solving skills?
Does the candidate have experience with other relevant technologies?

Next 20 minutes

Specific Elixir Radar development questions

The next 20 minutes of the interview should focus on the candidate's expertise with specific backend frameworks, their understanding of RESTful APIs, and their experience in handling data storage and retrieval efficiently.

What are some use cases where you would use Elixir Radar?
Elixir Radar can be used in various scenarios such as in web development, embedded software, data ingestion, and for building distributed and fault-tolerant systems.
How would you handle errors in Elixir?
Elixir uses a 'let it crash' philosophy for error handling. It employs supervisors which are specialized processes that monitor other processes and restart them when they crash.
Describe the difference between 'Agent' and 'GenServer' in Elixir.
Both 'Agent' and 'GenServer' are abstractions for state in Elixir. 'Agent' is simpler and used when you just need to keep state. 'GenServer' is more complex and used when you need to handle synchronous and asynchronous calls.
What are Elixir's data types and what are their uses?
Elixir has several data types including integers, floats, booleans, atoms, strings, lists, and tuples. Each has its own specific uses depending on the needs of the program.
How would you implement real-time features in an application using Elixir?
Elixir, together with the Phoenix framework, provides channels that can be used to build real-time features. Channels allow for bi-directional communication between clients and servers.
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The ideal back-end app developer

What you’re looking to see on the Elixir Radar engineer at this point.

At this point, a skilled Elixir Radar engineer should demonstrate strong problem-solving abilities, proficiency in Elixir Radar programming language, and knowledge of software development methodologies. Red flags include lack of hands-on experience, inability to articulate complex concepts, or unfamiliarity with standard coding practices.

Digging deeper

Code questions

These will help you see the candidate's real-world development capabilities with Elixir Radar.

What does this simple Elixir code do?
IO.puts 'Hello, World!'
This code prints the string 'Hello, World!' to the console.
What will be the output of this Elixir code?
IO.inspect(Enum.map([1, 2, 3, 4], fn x -> x * 2 end))
This code will output the list [2, 4, 6, 8]. It maps over the list [1, 2, 3, 4] and multiplies each element by 2.
What does this Elixir code do?
Enum.reduce([1, 2, 3, 4], 0, fn(x, acc) -> x + acc end)
This code reduces the list [1, 2, 3, 4] to a single value by adding each element to an accumulator, starting with 0. The result is 10.
What does this Elixir code do?
spawn(fn -> 1 + 2 end)
This code spawns a new process that adds 1 and 2 together. However, the result is not captured or returned, so it's essentially discarded.

Wrap-up questions

Final candidate for Elixir Radar Developer role questions

The final few questions should evaluate the candidate's teamwork, communication, and problem-solving skills. Additionally, assess their knowledge of microservices architecture, serverless computing, and how they handle Elixir Radar application deployments. Inquire about their experience in handling system failures and their approach to debugging and troubleshooting.

Describe the difference between Elixir and Erlang.
Elixir and Erlang run on the same BEAM virtual machine. However, Elixir has a more modern and approachable syntax, and it also provides powerful metaprogramming capabilities.
What are the protocols in Elixir and how would you define a new one?
Protocols are a way to achieve polymorphism in Elixir. You can define a new protocol using the 'defprotocol' keyword, and then implement it for a data type using 'defimpl'.
How would you handle distributed computing in Elixir?
Elixir provides built-in support for distributed computing. You can use the Node module to establish connections between different nodes, and then use message passing for communication between processes on these nodes.

Elixir Radar application related

Product Perfect's Elixir Radar development capabilities

Beyond hiring for your Elixir Radar engineering team, you may be in the market for additional help. Product Perfect provides seasoned expertise in Elixir Radar projects, and can engage in multiple capacities.