Personally I prefer in person interviews as take homes take a long time and I really only have time for that for positions I'm super interested in.
When I'm intereviewing people, I let them use what they're comfortable with. If they want to use a laptop, fine, if they want to use the one we provided, fine. If they want to use the whiteboard, fine. I can adapt. If they want to use any given programming language, also fine, I can read most of them and if I can't then it gives me a read on communication as they explain different lambda or whatever syntaxes to me.
I will say (and advise candidates) that you should use languages you are most comfortable in, and use what you're actually comfortable using for coding. Don't do java because you heard company X uses java and you learned it this weekend.
That said if you know python or ruby or similar language it's better for most interviews with algorithms or string manipulation. If the coding question is about byte arrays and memory allocation, c would be better. So I personally will flip languages in an interview I'm taking.
Having given around 500 interviews in the last 3 years, I will say that when people use computers they tend to focus on things like syntax more, as do the interviewers. These things tend to get ignored more on a whiteboard or without syntax highlighting.
I believe most mid to upper level programming interviews focus more on problem solving and communication, which does mean that if you get hung up on syntax (or the interviewer does) then you are burning valuable time on things that don't really get you that senior level signal you are looking for.
Eg the more time you can focus on showing you can solve problems, communicate, and design systems, and the less you are just arguing with the compiler, the better signal the interviewer is going to get on your experience.
At the end of the day, the only real interview that can get a good signal is working with the other person for a meaty period of time, usually several months. Thus all interviews are are inherently an artificial evaluation. It's just like taking standardized tests. You can get mad at the process or you can just get over it and optimize for getting the highest evaluation you can.
When I'm intereviewing people, I let them use what they're comfortable with. If they want to use a laptop, fine, if they want to use the one we provided, fine. If they want to use the whiteboard, fine. I can adapt. If they want to use any given programming language, also fine, I can read most of them and if I can't then it gives me a read on communication as they explain different lambda or whatever syntaxes to me.
I will say (and advise candidates) that you should use languages you are most comfortable in, and use what you're actually comfortable using for coding. Don't do java because you heard company X uses java and you learned it this weekend.
That said if you know python or ruby or similar language it's better for most interviews with algorithms or string manipulation. If the coding question is about byte arrays and memory allocation, c would be better. So I personally will flip languages in an interview I'm taking.
Having given around 500 interviews in the last 3 years, I will say that when people use computers they tend to focus on things like syntax more, as do the interviewers. These things tend to get ignored more on a whiteboard or without syntax highlighting.
I believe most mid to upper level programming interviews focus more on problem solving and communication, which does mean that if you get hung up on syntax (or the interviewer does) then you are burning valuable time on things that don't really get you that senior level signal you are looking for.
Eg the more time you can focus on showing you can solve problems, communicate, and design systems, and the less you are just arguing with the compiler, the better signal the interviewer is going to get on your experience.
At the end of the day, the only real interview that can get a good signal is working with the other person for a meaty period of time, usually several months. Thus all interviews are are inherently an artificial evaluation. It's just like taking standardized tests. You can get mad at the process or you can just get over it and optimize for getting the highest evaluation you can.