Gary Varga (1/15/2013)
A reasonable interview will test deeper understanding, however, the biggest problem is that some interviews are conducted so poorly these people that "learn by cramming" sometimes succeed. If they didn't then it wouldn't be worthwhile trying it on and therefore wouldn't be an issue.
To an extent, I agree. Cramming only helps with facts, and detailed facts at that. It doesn't do anything for understanding concepts. The value of a decent DBA is their ability to understand concepts and theory, and put that understanding into practice, so that's what an interview should be attempting to tease out.
That said, this world is full enough of charlatans as it is, so whilst I'm tempted to say any blagger and any company lax enough to hire them deserve each other, I certainly wouldn't want to do anything to help introduce them. After all, despite my best efforts, it may be my details they end up working on.
Semper in excretia, suus solum profundum variat