alt Hacker News>Take home exercises provide little to no signal, and screen out people who have families (who wouldn’t bother with a 4 hour take home exercise after work). I don’t want to see how you Google, I want to see how you think.
I tend to think that's very possibly true of developers (especially if they haven't worked in open source) but I wouldn't generalize that some combination of pointing to samples of past work and/or a take home isn't valid for a late-stage interview/demo in general. Jobs that involve a lot of writing or presenting, for example, probably require some demonstration of ability whether pre-existing or created for the purpose.
I'd also say that one mistake along this line was taking one such sample and assuming that it was close enough and could be upleveled with a bit of work.
I helped my friend from university get a job by helping him do their take-home exercise. I didn't write the code for him but I walked him through pretty much every single step. I'm not proud of that but my friend needed a job and I was in a position to help him get it. My principles are not nearly as important as that job was to him.
If you let people cheat they will cheat.