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Software Development

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3 rounds | 12 Coding problems

Interview preparation journey

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Journey
I started solving basic problem solving tag questions and then later on I moved to data structure concepts. Having a good knowledge of core subjects like object oriented programming, Database Management and Computer Network will help you to crack interviews easily.
Application story
The company visited my Campus in the month of August. There were total 3 rounds. Online test was conducted in offline mode from college labs and then the interview rounds were scheduled the very next day. First interview was a technical one and second one was managerial
Why selected/rejected for the role?
The main reason for my selection in this company was my confidence and level of knowledge. The interviewers went deep into the core concepts. They tried to confuse me with few possible options but I was confident enough with all my answers.
Preparation
Duration: 12 months
Topics: Basic searching and Sorting algorithms, Trees, Graph, Dynamic Programming, Linked List
Tip
Tip

Tip 1 : Have a good understanding of core subjects
Tip 2 : Prepare all the DSA topics (everything is important)

Application process
Where: Campus
Eligibility: 7CPI and above
Resume Tip
Resume tip

Tip 1: At least have one full stack project.
Tip 2: Try to work(make projects) on new technologies like cloud and ML

Interview rounds

01
Round
Easy
Online Coding Interview
Duration120 minutes
Interview date25 Aug 2022
Coding problem3

Section 1: There were 3 Coding questions. All questions were relatively easy to medium.
Section 2: Aptitude - It had very easy MCQ questions. There were 25 MCQ questions.
Section 3: Technical - There were a total of 47 MCQ-type questions based on core subjects.
There were also some output questions. Total time for OA was 2 hrs of which 1 hr was for section 1 and another 1 hr was for the other 2 sections.

1. Minimum Number of Platform Needed

Easy
23m average time
85% success
0/40
Asked in companies
Thought WorksGoldman SachsIntuit

You are given the arrival and departure times of N trains at a railway station in a day. You need to find the minimum of platforms required for the railway station such that no train waits i.e No train should wait for the platform to be clear or free.

Problem approach

This question is exactly similar to the minimum platform.
I solved it by sorting both the arrival and departure time arrays and calculating the max number of arrivals that are before the departure of any train.
Main logic - 
while(i {
if(arr[i]<=dep[j])
{
c++;
i++;
}
else
{
j++;c--;
}
ans=max(ans,c);
}
return ans.

Try solving now

2. Longest Subarray With Sum K.

Moderate
30m average time
50% success
0/80
Asked in companies
OLX GroupIntuitRestoLabs

Ninja and his friend are playing a game of subarrays. They have an array ‘NUMS’ of length ‘N’. Ninja’s friend gives him an arbitrary integer ‘K’ and asks him to find the length of the longest subarray in which the sum of elements is equal to ‘K’.

Ninjas asks for your help to win this game. Find the length of the longest subarray in which the sum of elements is equal to ‘K’.

If there is no subarray whose sum is ‘K’ then you should return 0.

Example:
Input: ‘N’ = 5,  ‘K’ = 4, ‘NUMS’ = [ 1, 2, 1, 0, 1 ]

Output: 4

There are two subarrays with sum = 4, [1, 2, 1] and [2, 1, 0, 1]. Hence the length of the longest subarray with sum = 4 is 4.
Try solving now

3. Aggressive Cows

Moderate
30m average time
70% success
0/80
Asked in companies
AdobeGoldman SachsDunzo

You are given an array 'arr' consisting of 'n' integers which denote the position of a stall.


You are also given an integer 'k' which denotes the number of aggressive cows.


You are given the task of assigning stalls to 'k' cows such that the minimum distance between any two of them is the maximum possible.



Example:
Input: 'n' = 3, 'k' = 2 and 'arr' = {1, 2, 3}

Output: 2

Explanation: The maximum possible minimum distance will be 2 when 2 cows are placed at positions {1, 3}. Here distance between cows is 2.
Problem approach

This is how I solved it -

bool chk(int dist,vector&v,int m)
{
int m_placed=1;
int prev=v[0];
for(int i=1;i=dist)
{
m_placed++;
if(m_placed==m)
return true;
prev=v[i];
}
}
return false;
}
int aggressiveCows(vector &v, int m)
{
// Write your code here.
sort(v.begin(),v.end());
long long int low=0;
int n=v.size();
long long int high=1e9;
long int ans=-1;
while(low<=high)
{
int mid=low+(high-low)/2;
if(chk(mid,v,m))
{
ans=mid;
low=mid+1;
}
else high=mid-1;
}
return ans;
}

Try solving now
02
Round
Medium
Face to Face
Duration2hr
Interview date26 Aug 2022
Coding problem6

The first round of interviews started with my introduction and a complete discussion of my projects. They asked me 2 coding questions then they asked me the question related to oops. Ex. Virtual function, Run time polymorphisms, Abstract Class, etc. All the basic to advance concepts of oops were asked in this round. Then they moved toward DBMS and asked me the questions like indexing, DML, DDL, Joins, Subquery, Normalization, Denormalization, and some medium level SQL queries on HAVING AND GROUP BY clause. This round went for like more than one and half hour.

1. DBMS

What are ACID properties

Problem approach

Tip 1:Be concise and to thee point
Tip 2: Explain with real life example

2. OOPs

What is Virtual function, Run time polymorphisms,

what are Abstract Classes? How we achieve run time polymorphism in C.

 

Problem approach

Tip 1: Try to explain with block of code
Tip 2: Try to ask for more clarity on question if you are getting confused

3. DBMS

what are DML, DDL commands.

4. SQL Question

SQl querry to find out how many people visited the museum on each day.

Problem approach

SELECT date, COUNT(*)
FROM visit
GROUP BY date;

5. Longest Subsequence With Difference One

Moderate
30m average time
70% success
0/80
Asked in companies
HSBCAmazonCIS - Cyber Infrastructure

You are given an array “nums” of size N. Your task is to find the length of the longest subsequence of array “nums” such that the absolute difference between every adjacent element in the subsequence is one.

For Example:
If “nums” = {2, 1, 3}.

The valid non-empty subsequences of the array are {2}, {1}, {3}, {2, 1}, {1, 3}, {2, 3} and {2, 1, 3}. So, the longest subsequence satisfying the given conditions are {2, 1} and {2, 3}. The length of the longest subsequence is 2. So, the answer is 2.

The subsequence of an array is a sequence of numbers that can be formed by deleting some or no elements without changing the order of the remaining elements. For example, if the given array “nums” = {1, 2, 5, 4, 8}, then {1, 2, 5, 4, 8}, {1, 5, 8}, {2} are some of the valid subsequences whereas the sequence {4, 2} is not a valid subsequence as the order of the elements differ from the original array.

Note:
Any subsequence of length = 1 is also a valid subsequence.
Problem approach

The idea is to first sort the array and find the longest subarray with consecutive elements. After sorting the array and removing the multiple occurrences of elements, run a loop and keep a count and max (both initially zero). Run a loop from start to end and if the current element is not equal to the previous (element+1) then set the count to 1 else increase the count. Update max with a maximum of count and max.

Try solving now

6. DBMS

what is normalisation and denomarlisation?

what are joins?

03
Round
Easy
HR Round
Duration30-35 minutes
Interview date26 Aug 2022
Coding problem3

The second round started with my introduction and then he asked me behavioral questions and questions related to the company like, what they do, why Fastenal etc. This round went for like 30-35 minutes.

1. Basic HR Question

Why Fastenal

Problem approach

Tip 1: Try to do some research on the company so you could make up a good point
Tip 2: Try to show some common behavior in your personality and the company environment.

2. Basic HR Question

Why do you think you are the best fit for this company

Problem approach

Tip 1:Try to explain your capabilities that match with the company's work culture
Tip 2: Try to explain your skill in good sense

3. HR Question

Introduce yourself?

Here's your problem of the day

Solving this problem will increase your chance to get selected in this company

Skill covered: Programming

What is recursion?

Choose another skill to practice
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