Day XXXII, 2nd, May
Mailied.
So this is the beginning of the diary for the second month of unemployment.
I wish it would be delightful month, so I decided to use Goethe’s poem Mailied, which presents a delightful scene of May, to be the keyword of the very first post.
So. New beginning. I would say that the May shall be of a very different style – I mainly focused on pet project writing without thinking of too much about practical interviews, but now, I AM prepraring specifically for the interviews and specifically the programming ones. Going forward, the style shall continue, until I got an offer of satisfactory.
The experience is very much different from the project doing, while I sometimes feel that I gain more than project doing from practising small problems. I think this to some extent makes sense – this is as if I am eating fine rices, as the small problems are merits and fundamentals of advanced composite problems. But I need to be aware that eating too much rice isn’t good for my health – I need to dine crops like grains and corns which are of coarse quality, which are as project doing which makes my stomach even more robust.
(Errr… what am I talking about…
OK. Let the play begin.
Day XXXIII, 3rd, May
Practise and Review.
More leetcode problems. I find myself more proficient in handling backtracking and DP problems – it might be a good way to practise by tags :smile:
And just started to read the book advanced linux programming to review relevant knowledge. Thought not very thick, this book illustrates many key points well.
Another thing is that I reviewed some interview sharing in 1point3acres, for companies like NVIDIA and UBER… Well, I need to do better in lower-level knowledge… (and that’s why I started to read the book aforementioned!!
Day XXXIV, 4th, May
Youth.
I wish I were still a youth, while according to the definition of the UN, 24 is the upperbound. Alas!!
Just finished the first section (5 chapters) of the Advanced Linux Programming. Really comprehensive. Looking forward to getting more out of it reading the following chapters.
And leetcode-on – today’s topic is mostly Graph – simple, when I know the approach, and elegant, when I know that the problem can be modeled as graph. Besides, I am also starting to do string problems, which is really a big chunk. I feel that string problems are mostly not difficult, but really tricky and challenges my carefulness.
So it’s been a few days without hearing any updates from my delivered resumes. Time to further fill the queue.
Day XXXV, 5th, May
Sent.
Not very productive today in terms of code writing – I put most effort on reviewing computer architecture.
Finally I have made a decision to try Compute Architect. I am not sure I can get it, but at least I have made it clear to myself – I am not going to yield to remain being a tester. I need to and will jump out of the comfort zone to embrace the world of challenging.
And I am considering applying for even more positions of the companies that I was not that fond of. Lacking of interview responses makes me anxious.
Day XXXVI, 6th, May
Computer Architecture
Continuing reviewing. Nothing special, except that I got a call from AMD and scheduled an interview next week while no further details were provided from their side. Not sure if there would be any update later… I understand that I may not be a good fit for verification as I did not have relevant experience. But I wish to have a try anyway.
Also just realised that this course is essentially following the Computer Architecture – a Quantitative Approach. OK. Two days being reviewing the book… And old memories (not only the days taking the princeton course, but also the colledge days…) came into my mind…
I think I deserve an interview…
BTW. I eventually applied for a router RnD position in CDNS. Back to the origin… Wish this would be my last stand…
Something saw today:
The flowers in Xi Garden blooms. I wish I could be settled before they die. And they really resemble the ones I used to keep, though they are gone forever, with my premature emotion.
Day XXXIX, 9th, May
AMD.
After reviewing computer architecture for two days, which are irrelevant to today’s interview, I went to AMD for an interview.
It was just plain and simple technically. But the hiring manager’s concern really surprised me – he was concerned about my current unemployment status – quitting before finding a job.
He just doesnt believe that my reason for leaving is simply a feeling of lack of challenging. He believes that job is only possibly challenging to NCGs, while for senior persons, they have experiences and they are supposed to do / be accepted to do what they already have been doing. And he thinks that working is simply a means of living, and has nothing to do with interest – one can do more about his interests after work, and maybe apply his after-work knowledge to work sometimes if possible. But work is equal to interest? No.
I had to say that I disagreed with him about all these points of view, and kept saying my reason for leave.
I am not sure if this was his real thinking, or it was merely a pretending stress test. If it was real, I have to reconsider if I really want to report to him, though from his thorough description this position is very much to my interest. (and he was the second interviewing manager I have ever encountered who deliberately and thoroughly elaborate the position. For this I appreciate his effort.)
Anyway… This is merely less than half-way. I need to continue working on leetcode and CA.
Day XXXX, 10th, May
CA.
Reviewed the chapter data-level-parallelism in vector, SIMD and GPU. Reviewing instruction-level-parallelism chapter. Since many of the key points were covered in the coursera course and I am somewhat familiar with CUDA, it is not quite difficult.
No call received today.
BTW, Korean food in FamilyMart really sucks… Too spicy!!
Day XXXX, 12th, May
New space…
All diaries now got to this…
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