[Daycrawler]

The first part of the article where the author explains how time-consuming it is to study algorithms can really be applied to any field of study. The fact that the author spends much time learning algorithm doesn't mean that he's "dumb" as he humbly presents himself, it just means that he's just getting started. It's like trying to pick up guitar and when you realize that it really is hard and takes time you decide after one month that you're not a talented guitar player.

Then there the second part where the author considers algorithmic knowledge as useless (or not so much useless at best) because the tools available to a programmer already implement any relevant algorithm.

There's some ironic parallel between this way of thinking and algorithmic proficiency, actually. Many algorithms work by leveraging data structures whose understanding of internal working isn't needed. For example, one way to efficiently merge N sorted list into one big sorted list is to use a priority queue. Do you need to know how a priority queue is implemented to find this solution? Not at all. You just need to know the interface it offers, and the complexity of each method. Finding the k-th smallest element in a list can be done using a heap. Do you need to know how a heap is implemented to find this solution? Not at all. You just need to know what a heap does.

Really, studying algorithms is like studying the C++ standard library, except that instead of knowing about classes and methods as your toolbox, you know data structures (and common patterns) as your toolbox. Of course any curious mind will then go deeper and actually read about how those things are implemented, building an even better understanding of the foundations, and solving even deeper problems with it.

While being an interesting parallel, this doesn't really answers the author's questioning about: what's the point? Which brings us to what the author forgot to address in his article: white board test. The title of article sets the scene with someone wanting to find a job in one of those big tech company hiring people who can pass the whiteboard tests, but then who somehow... forget about it and decides to abandon this endeavor? Well, fair enough, but to be perfectly honest, while Google & Cie engineers certainly aren't spinning up algorithms on a daily basis like mad computer scientists, the engineering level there is still quite high. So there's definitely some basis in wanting to pass the whiteboard interview, mostly working with intelligent people.