If I'm interviewing for people to work in some specific tech stack or business, it's just as good to see completely different things they can show. Could be a php site for their book club or whatever. But the key is to have some code to discuss that is their code. Because I want to see them describe and reason about code they know, and it works 10x better if it's code they know, rather than some code I present and say "here, let's reason about this code".

Why not discuss a problem you have? You're obviously hiring for someone to solve your problem. Looking to check if they can code (in a specific language) seems like the XY problem.

Because they aren't familiar with or enthusiastic about the code I give them, they could be about code they have written. It's the classic "describe one time you did something poorly/well"-question, but with code. I want to see them critique some code, or explain what's so great, or why it ended up the way it is.

Reasoning about a problem i have (even showing some code) is also a good part of an interview. But it's my side of the field. I just found it's much better to move the interview to the interviewee's side of the turf, because they are more comfortable there.

I would like to just be asked. I can't post my code on github but I can talk about my projects at length.

For all this thread solution is simple. Small take home assignment where you write the code to discuss during the interview.

I know people are vocal about not wanting to do take homes. But if take home is reasonable and used as a talking piece it checks all the boxes for good tool.

I think in reality I had single person that outright refused and of course bunch of people who didn’t bother to deliver - great candidates delivered it the same day, busy great candidates delivered it over the weekend.