A common
Microsoft interview question (known for the
brainteasers) is this (it's on the
Internet all over the place, so I'm not giving away anything):
You are in a situation where you have three
light switches, each corresponding to a
lightbulb in another room. You need to figure out a way to figure out which
lightswitch corresponds to each
lightbulb, without guessing. You only get to go in the other room once, and you start in the room with the switches.
The correct
solution is to "
think outside the box". Turn one on until it is
warm, then shut that off, and turn
another one on, and immediately enter the
room. The warm one is the frst switch, the on one is the second one, the third one is the lightbulb that is off and cold.
Coming back from my time at
MS, I was loaded with these questions (it's a neat little hobby over there), so I ask my
brother this one. He thinks for a minute, and then get's it. "Jam a
screwdriver in one, turn on one, walk in the
room. The one with the
lightbulb blown or the one that's
exploded is the first switch..." etc. The rest he got dead on.
I guess that's thinking a little more
violently "outside the box" than people were looking for. If only people had more
creative impulses than
destructive ones....