PhysicsWallah interview experience Real time questions & tips from candidates to crack your interview

Software Developer

PhysicsWallah
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3 rounds | 4 Coding problems

Interview preparation journey

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Journey
When I was in school time, the field of Computer Science excited me. Then, I got admission to IGNOU, because I always dreamed of being a Software Developer, so I started to get into that line of learning. I learned DSA and web Development to build my resume, an attractive resume. I applied to the PW SDE in my Final year of graduation, and getting SDE profile to write in your resume is a must.
Application story
got to know that PW was hiring an SDE when I was in the final year of my graduation. I applied through campus drive and received a mail from them that I was assigned an assessment test. I passed that test, and then the interview process started and at last, I was selected for that role.
Why selected/rejected for the role?
I think I had the appropriate skills and a good amount of knowledge to prove that I was the right man for the post. I also solved coding questions in an optimal manner.
Preparation
Duration: 2 Months
Topics: primarily DSA, linked list, stack, queue, graphs and tree, DP
Tip
Tip

Tip 1 : Aptitude is must.
Tip 2 : Practice puzzle problems.
Tip 3 : Do atleast 2 projects.

Application process
Where: Campus
Eligibility: 7 CGPA
Resume Tip
Resume tip

Tip 1 : projects should be well mentioned
Tip 2 : also don't forget to mention your grades of all academic levels

Interview rounds

01
Round
Medium
Video Call
Duration45 Minutes
Interview date9 Feb 2022
Coding problem1

This round was scheduled in the morning hours from 10:30 to 11:15 AM. I was informed about the round 2 days earlier through an e-mail and a phone call both.

1. Ninja And Candies

Moderate
15m average time
85% success
0/80
Asked in companies
Goldman SachsAmazonApple

Ninja is a boy who lives in ninjaland. Every day, during the morning he gets 1 coin from his mother. He wants to buy exactly ‘N’ candies. Each of the candies cost 2 coins usually and 1 coin if it is on sale. Ninja has to buy exactly K[i] candies of the i-th type(he buys candies in the evening).

Ninjas can buy any(possibly zero) number of candies of any type during any day(if he has enough money to do it). If the candy is on sale he can buy it for 1 coin and otherwise he has to buy it for 2 coins.

There are ‘M’ special offers in the candy shop. The j-th offer (D[j], C[j]) means that candies of the C[j]-th type are on sale during the D[j]-th day.

Ninja wants to buy all candies as soon as possible. Your task is to calculate the minimum day when he can buy all the candies.

Try solving now
02
Round
Easy
Video Call
Duration50 minutes
Interview date11 Feb 2022
Coding problem2

After the first round, some candidates were shortlisted and I was one of them which was scheduled 2 days later at the same time.

1. Umbrella

Moderate
25m average time
75% success
0/80
Asked in companies
SamsungDisney + HotstarArcesium

You are given ‘N’ types of umbrellas, where each umbrella can shelter some number of people. Given the number of people each umbrella can shelter in the array “UMBRELLA”, you need to determine the minimum number of umbrellas required to cover exactly ‘M’ people with umbrellas.

Note -

You have an infinite number of umbrellas of each type.
If it is not possible to shelter exactly ‘M’ people then print -1. 
Try solving now

2. Santa Claus and His Magic Bag

Easy
10m average time
90% success
0/40
Asked in companies
Disney + HotstarVisaPhysicsWallah

This year Santa Claus got a magic bag for bringing gifts for children. So magical thing about this magic bag is that, whenever the number of gifts inside the bag becomes strictly less than 'K' gifts, it automatically refills back to its full capacity(say its capacity is of 'N' gifts). Now a child can ask for 'M' (some positive integer less than 'N') gifts from Santa. This reduces the number of gifts in the bag by 'M'.

On the occasion of Christmas, when Santa Claus arrived, children of your locality made a queue for taking gifts from Santa Claus. But some greedy kids can ask for more gifts than the current number of gifts in the bag which is regarded as invalid demand and that kid doesn't get any gift.

You are watching this distribution of gifts, and become curious about knowing the number of gifts remaining in Santa's bag after giving gifts to a kid. You get the ordered list of demands of kids as 'DEMANDS', can you tell which are invalid demands and how many gifts left in the bag if the demand is valid?

Note:

1. You can assume Magic Bag is completely filled initially.

2. If the demand by a kid is invalid print -1 which will denote this invalid demand.
Try solving now
03
Round
Easy
HR Round
Duration30 Minutes
Interview date11 Feb 2022
Coding problem1

It was a simple conversation, no shortlisting was done here, all of the students who passed the previous round were offered the role.

1. Basic HR Questions

Who is your role model.

Tell me about yourself.

Problem approach

Tip 1 : try to be practical whenever claiming something
Tip 2 : try to be honest and disciplined with your answers

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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