I mean, you need to convince the person that is reviewing your application that you are somehow extra special. I find it hard to understand how you'll do that by being arrogant and rude.

> Contributing to open source projects matters more than your marks in school to us and to a lot of other companies around.

Maybe it matters more to them and perhaps it's specific to India, but in Canada participation of a candidate in open source projects is of just a cursory interest. Besides quoted exchange states that they simply wanted to look at guy's code. If so, then just ask for it. Getting into "thou shalt contribute to the open source" tirade is pretty much pointless given the context.

In Montreal, many companies routinely ask if a developer has open source projects, or code samples.

If a company doesn't do this they are hiring based on resume and interview only, rather than seeing actual code.

That's exactly my point. No one here (at least in my experience) focuses on open source contributions per se. The end goal generally is to look at some code that a candidate have written, not necessarily the open source one.

Of course there are exceptions. For certain positions you will get a big bonus for any contributions to a specific high-profile open source project. But this has less to do with a code you wrote and more with domain knowledge you picked up along the way.

But I think the question of open source contribution is completely different from "show us some code." The latter is intended to get a look at some of the actual work you've produced; the former is just another part of your work experience, formal or informal.

How about people who don't capitalize first letter in the sentence and don't put a dot at the end ? :)

+ lack of open source and 1 year, tells me that this is someone who just picked up a book and hasn't really done anything yet

http://www.google.com/trends?q=programming

The problem is for many, its a job, just like working at McDonalds — they aren't like us, they don't go home and work on open source projects and the like.

Also, with the mass of people doing it, especially those with little passion for the industry, they sometimes don't take care when it comes to security, etc..

Now thats not to say all developers from India are bad programmers, I've worked with quite a few code ninjas...you've just got to be careful!

I have projects with 20-100 LOC up on github, for my own convenience. It costs me nothing to make these public if I can't sell them - that's not charity.

I'm not some piece of machinery that can work 24/7 so there are certain externalities that don't quite match up to accounting. Goodwill perhaps?

I get paid a certain salary whether I show up for 30 or 60 hours. It doesn't matter so long as the work gets done. If you're a contractor, do you take your time while your asleep and deduct it as a business cost?

Even if you are at home, your time costs money. Opportunity costs.

Communication skills are important in development, especially when you're working on a team and for someone else. The cover letter / intro email is the first test in the hiring process. Even if English is not your first language, you should be able to effectively introduce yourself, your skill set, your experience, and your interest in the position -- plus answer any other questions in the job posting.

This candidate failed the very first test. The "delete" key -- or, if the hiring manager is super nice, the "no thanks, good luck" reply -- should have been used immediately.

Huh? I know plenty of Indian open source developers (myself included)