Brute-Forcing My Algorithmic Ignorance with an LLM in 7 Days

The honest ones who admit they used it as a learning tool rather than a shortcut are getting more useful out of it than anyone else.

Interesting article - but perhaps a bit light on details in some places, like:

> I generated a list of the most common interview tasks

How? I suppose they mean gathered, or searched for, not strictly generated?

Also a little light on details of the actual interview.

I'm also a little confused about the listing of "problems" - do they refer to some specific leet-code site's listing of problems?

It seems like half-way between naming an actual algorithm/problem and naming a concrete exercise.

As for:

> How is it that we do not use this "forgotten and forbidden" coding in our daily production code, even though all highly reusable, useful code is essentially an exploitation of the intersection between classical algorithmic thinking and real-world problems?

I'm not sure what to say - most of this stuff lives in library code and data structure implementations for any language in common use?

Indeed the one saving grace of leet code interview is arguably that it shows if the candidate can choose sane data structures (and algorithms) when implementing real-world code?

Very cool, I have personally been studying zk-cryptography with a similar approach, works really well with some caveats. Will save this article and try this version as well when the time comes!

This is very interesting, I've been using LLM to learn new things that way and it really worked. To some extent, learning with LLM is better than taking any course, even with a tutor, as I am getting something prepared for me, in terms of my experience, progress level, etc.

LLM is going to change schools and universities a lot, teachers, tutors will have to find themselves in the new reality, as they have a strong competitor with infinite resources and huge knowledge, patient and ready to work with every student in a distinct way, according to student's needs, level, intelligence, etc.

Instruction-based tutoring is dead from that perspective, why should I follow someone reciting a book or online tutorial, while there is a tool that can introduce me into subject in a better and more interesting way?

Sure, there are great teachers, who are inspiring people, who are able to present the topic in a great way, the point is, they are minority. Now, everyone can have a great tutor for a few dollars a month (or for free, if you don't need generating too much data quickly).