Details

Status: SDE-2 at Directi (Zeta)
Position: SDE at Linkedin
Location: Bangalore, India
Date: January 8, 2022

Interview format

Online round

The process comprises a total of 6 rounds

Round 1: This round is an online hacker-rank test. The test comprises 4 problems in total. You are supposed to solve all 4 problems in 90 minutes duration in order to qualify for future rounds of interviews.

Round 2 and Round 3: These rounds comprise of Data-structures and algorithms. Both the rounds were of 1-hour duration.

Round 4: This round is a system design round. You are supposed to do a High-level system design of the given problem in 1-hour duration.

Round 5: This is a technical communication round. In this round, the interviewer discusses your past experiences and projects. You are cross-questioned on your projects in this round.

Round 6: This is the host manager round.

Interview Experience

Online round (Hacker-rank)

I don’t remember the exact questions. I was able to solve all 4 of them in the given time frame.

Round 1 (DSA and Problem-solving Round)

Problem 1:

Given an array, divide the array into K subsets with equal sum. 

Link: https://leetcode.com/problems/partition-to-k-equal-sum-subsets/

Problem 2:

You are given a N x N boolean matrix. Each element of the matrix denotes whether the ith person knows the jth person or not. Your task is to find the celebrity amongst the N people.

Link: https://leetcode.com/problems/find-the-celebrity/

Round 2 (DSA and Problem-solving Round)

Problem 1:

Given a BST, find K nodes that are nearest to the target.

Link: https://leetcode.com/problems/closest-binary-search-tree-value-ii/

Problem 2:

Implement a Data-structure that allows the following operations in O(1) Time Complexity.

1. Increment(key): Increment the frequency of a key.

2. Decrement(key): Decrement the frequency of a key.

3. MaxFrequency(): Return the key with the maximum frequency.

4. MinFrequency(): Return the key with the minimum frequency.

Link: https://leetcode.com/problems/all-oone-data-structure/

Round 3 (System Design round)

The problem was to design the CoderPad interface. CoderPad is a tool where Linkedin interviews are conducted. I was asked to design the following features:


1. Code editor: The interviewee can write code. The interviewer can see the same in real-time. For the purpose of this round, we can assume that interviewer can not edit on the editor.

2. Drawing pad: The drawing pad allows the interviewee to draw anything. It is more like an MS Paint. The interviewer should be able to see the things drawn in real-time.

3. Invite: The interviewer has an option to invite people to join the unique CoderPad link. In this case, the interviewer can write the email ID of the respective person and can invite him/her.

4. Replay: CoderPad has an option to replay the entire interview. This feature basically creates a video of the entire interview and shows it to you. You can see at what timestamp, what action was done on CoderPad.

   The interviewer wanted to discuss the above features based on the Database, Scaling, and API layer.

Round 4 (Technical Communication Round)

This round involved a detailed discussion of the projects that I have done in my previous organization. The interviewer expected me to explain the projects like he is a new-joiner in my team and is going to replace me.

Round 5 (Host Manager Round)

This round was more about the conversation about myself, my experience, some of the projects I have worked on in my previous company, etc. It was more about analyzing how you will perform when put in different situations. 

In this round, the interviewer asked me about how will I tackle the problem of people posting spam on Linkedin in the year 2007 when we actually don’t have the solution to the problem and in the year 2022 when we actually have the data to solve the problem.

All the Best!!