>who really can’t dedicate another 4 hours for another take home test.<p>My last job search I took the one that didn't demand a take home test rather than waste time on the job that was far more interesting, given that a take home test is also a crap shoot. I had done a great interview, the job had definite things I could bring to the table that others couldn't, the guy interviewing loved me but wanted me to do a take home test - for the same money as this other company that was a boring e-commerce thing, although international.<p>The problem is not just 4 hours. I have actually only ever had one that really took exactly 4 hours. Most take 5-6 hours because there are things that are left out of the consideration as to what is required.<p>I also wonder how this 4 hours time is hit upon? I have to expect most places ask their devs to come up with a problem that will take about 4 hours. And the devs do that. Obviously these are the devs that are really good at making exact estimations of how long any software development task takes, so no problems there.<p>One task I had to do for one interview I found there were some bugs meaning that the library needed could not just install on my machine I had to do a bunch of work to get it to work on my machine. I followed the git issues thread that was several pages trying out different solutions. Finally got it to work, that was 4 hours! I could now do the 4 hour task. I instead sent a message - hey can't do it, I spent 4 hours doing the get ready to do the task part because of the issues in this github thread, so I guess it's not worth continuing.<p>They sent back "no send us what you have! It's ok"<p>So I sent a repo consisting of a package json and a couple configuration files for used libraries, and a note saying this is it because I spent 4 hours doing this issues fix to get this library to work on my machine with link.<p>The guy who was supposed to evaluate my work sent back a message that my repo was particularly underwhelming. Which, no shit, that's why I sent a message I didn't want to continue! I spent 4 hours making your requested resources work on my machine, I'm not spending a theoretical other 4 hours to actually provide you some code.