>There is a certain danger in being educated, for example a self educated programmer might have a problem and just implement a O(n^2) solution and move on whereas a college educated programmer might spend excessive time trying to work out a way to do it in O(log N)
The CS graduate will have covered big O classifications but if they immediately focus on this form of optimization it's probably because they have spent years reading blogs that tell them this is the nature of tests at places like Google.
If every CS grad automatically thought this way by virtue of their education there would be no reason to test for it in interviews simply because a CS degree is often a minimum requirement for the kind of job where you'll be asked these questions.
It's only a priority if you make it one and those self-taught guys can probably self-teach themselves big O.
The CS graduate will have covered big O classifications but if they immediately focus on this form of optimization it's probably because they have spent years reading blogs that tell them this is the nature of tests at places like Google.
If every CS grad automatically thought this way by virtue of their education there would be no reason to test for it in interviews simply because a CS degree is often a minimum requirement for the kind of job where you'll be asked these questions.
It's only a priority if you make it one and those self-taught guys can probably self-teach themselves big O.