I have been summoned home to help with my dad. He is still the same, In hospital awaiting surgery. My family are intense and insane.

Dammit. UCLA asked for work samples which makes me think they are going to compare them to other people's work samples, but I don't have any! It would be illegal!

I told them I'd be happy to work with them--to walk through creation of any of the artefacts, or to write up segments of documents with them, but...should I really be keeping my work? This is at least the third time I've been asked, but this is the first time it's making me anxious.

Maybe indicating how seriously you take information security in that fashion will be a selling point?

Could you strip out all identifying information from something?

Yeah, I don't know how you are supposed to comply with that.

Man, a whole lot of stuff that I usually bring home on a Friday got left in my cube this week. This is what happens when I get a name plate, I guess. I get complacent. Or I really was ready to get out of there, which god knows I was.

I told them I'd be happy to work with them--to walk through creation of any of the artefacts, or to write up segments of documents with them, but...should I really be keeping my work? This is at least the third time I've been asked, but this is the first time it's making me anxious.

I've rarely had samples of my tech work for the same reasons, and I offer the same thing you did, ita. Most places are fine with that.

Could you strip out all identifying information from something?

But I never keep anything. It's not mine and I don't work on my own computers so it would have to be actively purloining it...I don't share anything more complex than notes from my tablet between my devices and theirs.

Though maybe I Dropboxed something once?

I think that's a common disconnect between academia and industry hiring. We do a lot of open source at my work. Technically, the stuff the CSC people work on should be proprietary to CSC. Last time CSC tried to pull that hand, the person quit. And was rehired by AURA and CSC was told to go hang. But we run into this sometimes when we hire someone whose history is largely corporate (because of the varied skills gained in the astro field, there are a lot of people like me who terminated the field before the higher degrees, but followed into it on the tech side, but stayed In quasi-academic settings.)

Sat on by a Loki, waiting for a call to go transport volatile chem waste. Just a usual Friday night...

ita, I think your instincts are right. Work product is something I've been asked for but could never provide. Unless there was something intended to be public, offering to do something for them is about what you and they should respect that.