Graduated 4 months ago and I can't write basic syntax without AI. Is this even a problem or is this just how it works now
I graduated in December and I've been interviewing since January. Got a take-home last week, build a small REST API with filtering and pagination. Used Claude for most of it, passed, got invited to the second round which is a live pair programming session. And now I'm sitting here realizing I couldn't rewrite half the stuff I submitted without AI helping me.
It's not that I don't understand the code. I can read through every line and explain what it does, why the middleware is structured that way, how the query parameters get validated. But if you put me in front of a blank editor and said "write the pagination logic" I'd be sitting there trying to remember if it's Math.ceil or Math.floor for total pages and wether the offset is (page - 1) * limit or page * limit. Stuff that I've written dozens of times during my degree but never actually from memory because there was always an AI assistant or a previous project to copy from.
In fear and anticipation for the 2nd interview I started practicing syntax with a free app I found and honestly two weeks of that has helped more than I expected. but the bigger question is does this even matter anymore? Half the devs I know use AI for everything at work. Are interviews going to keep testing something nobody actually does on the job, or is this just hazing at this point.
Edit: People are getting hung up on the ceil vs floor and I think I just provided a really bad example. I know the mathematical difference. I couldn't come up with anything else on the spot. A proper example would be that I forget the structure of callbacks for functions. Not that I don't understand what the function itself would do.
Edit 2: Man, this sub is ripping me a new one and I have to say I feel very bad about it. This is not the tough love I expected. I've already been practicing since my interview with freecodecamp/codefluent but there's only so much time in a day. If anything, I guess this is fuel for my anxiety to start working on this a lot harder.