Microsoft | SDE2 | GA | October 2021 [Rejected]
Anonymous User
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Initial round: Codility
3 questions - 1 debugging & 2 coding
Pretty easy

Virtual Onsite:
Round 1 - Given a string ab23^&ww08h rearrange the string so that the output is abwwh2308^&. Constraint: No extra memory
Experience - Solved it using two pointers. Ran for a couple of examples and then failed for an edge case. Identified the bug but was out of time so couldn't fix it.

Round 2 - https://leetcode.com/problems/3sum/. Constraint: No extra memory
Experience - I felt that the initial behavioral question took a little longer because I told the interviewer an approach using sort+two pointer+binary search and he told me to write the code but when I had like 5 more lines, he said time's up. Definitely need to up my speed here.

Round 3 - https://leetcode.com/problems/lru-cache/
Experience - Told the LinkedList+HashMap implementation. Interviewer gave a big smile. Coded and ran it through all the test cases and had ~3 mins to spare at the end.

Round 4 - https://leetcode.com/problems/spiral-matrix/. Constraint: No extra memory
Experience - Worst round for me. The no extra memory threw me off a bit. Said BFS but then corrected myself as it would use a queue. Then said DFS but the interviewer asked for a different approach. Said about going edge wise (top then right then bottom then left). Asked me to code. Started coding but halfway through got more questions and couldn't finish writing.

All in all not dishearteaned. All of the problems are pretty doable if you have been practicing. Hope this helps. All the best to other fellow interviwees.

P.S: After getting the mail this morning, asked the recruiter how long is the cool down period. No reply. Does anyone have any idea? Thanks.

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