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Software Engineering Fundamentals Interview Questions
Practice 9403 coding, system design and machine learning questions from 546 companies, sorted by role, topic and interview round. Every question has step-by-step hints, a code runner that supports 8 languages and an AI mentor; members also get the full solution walkthrough.
- 9403
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- 546
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- 11
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Showing 271–300 of 448 results
- MithrilMediumSoftware EngineerDebug GPU Resource Allocation
This problem tests your ability to identify and debug concurrency issues and scheduling logic in a custom GPU resource manager.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteConcurrencyDebuggingScheduling - MongoDBMediumSoftware EngineerDebug a slow concurrent network server under load
This question tests your ability to diagnose performance bottlenecks in a multi-threaded network server using I/O multiplexing, focusing on how blocking calls and thread management impact latency.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteConcurrencyPerformance TuningI/O Multiplexing - MongoDBHardSoftware EngineerImplement a Finite Concurrent Web Crawler
Implement an orchestrator for a finite concurrent web crawler featuring transactional URL state tracking, per-host politeness rate-limiting, classified error handling, and robust termination detection.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteConcurrencySystem DesignQueues - NVIDIAMediumSoftware EngineerCompare Java and Python: Execution, Typing, Concurrency and When to Use Each
An engineering director asks how Java and Python differ and where each language is stronger or weaker. It tests understanding of execution models, static versus dynamic typing, concurrency and the global interpreter lock, ecosystems, and the judgment to recommend a language for a concrete project.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAMediumSoftware EngineerDemonstrate software engineering fundamentals
This interview question evaluates engineering fundamentals, trade-offs, examples, pitfalls, and operational implications in a realistic interview setting. A strong answer for Demonstrate software engineering fundamentals states assumptions, handles edge cases, explains trade-offs, and shows how to validate the result clearly.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAMediumSoftware EngineerHow AI Coding Tools Change Software Development and When to Trust Their Output
An open-ended question from a director round asks how AI is changing software development and whether engineers should trust AI-generated code. It tests a balanced position on benefits and failure modes, how generated code should be verified, team practices for review and security, and how to measure real impact.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAMediumSoftware EngineerImplement a Thread-Safe Reference-Counted Smart Pointer in C++
Implement a reference-counted smart pointer class template in C++ from scratch, with copy and move construction and assignment, reset, dereferencing and a use count. It tests ownership rules, self-assignment and exception safety, atomic reference counting with correct memory ordering, and extensions such as weak pointers, base-class conversion and reference cycles.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAMediumSoftware EngineerOptimize a small-string C++ class
This question evaluates low-level C/C++ systems programming skills, including memory management, data layout, small-string optimization, efficient copying semantics, alignment/padding, and cache-aware performance reasoning.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAMediumSoftware EngineerStreaming Top-K Frequent Elements with O(1) Updates Instead of a Heap
Design a structure that consumes an unbounded stream and reports the K most frequent elements at any time, first with a heap and then with constant-time updates after the interviewer rejects the heap. It tests per-operation cost analysis, data-structure invariants, deterministic tie handling, and extensions to sliding windows, approximate counting, and sharded streams.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAHardSoftware EngineerVerification Plan for a FIFO, a Round-Robin Arbiter and a Valid/Ready Handshake
A hardware design-verification interview question: plan how to verify a FIFO, a round-robin arbiter and a valid/ready handshake interface. It tests testbench architecture with scoreboards and reference models, constrained-random stimulus, corner cases, SystemVerilog assertions and functional coverage.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NVIDIAEasySoftware EngineerWrite a Tiny Linux Resource Reporter That Flags Usage Spikes
Write a small Linux agent that reads live CPU, memory and disk usage from kernel-exposed files, reports them as JSON to a collector endpoint over HTTP, and adds a rolling-window check that only flags a sustained resource spike rather than a single noisy reading.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsitelinuxsystemshttp - NetflixHardData EngineerExplain concurrency and reliability tradeoffs
This problem tests your understanding of balancing thread-safe resource management in a high-concurrency local environment against the systemic requirements of a distributed data pipeline.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteConcurrencyDistributed SystemsCaching - NetflixMediumSoftware EngineerModel Direct-Sold DSP Orders
This Software Engineering Fundamentals question evaluates data and domain modeling skills for ad-technology order management, focusing on entities such as advertisers, agencies, orders, line items, targeting, creatives, delivery constraints, tracking events, reporting needs, and configuration versioning.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - NetflixMediumSoftware EngineerReason About a Movie Billboard Rotation Component
This problem tests the ability to manage dynamic scheduling and priority updates using balanced binary search trees (ordered maps) while handling concurrency and system scalability.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteData StructuresConcurrencySystem Design - NotionMediumSoftware EngineerDesign a Todo List Object Model
Tests object-oriented design, domain modeling, and API design skills by implementing an extensible, hierarchical Todo list model with task dependency management and filtering.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteObject-Oriented DesignAPI DesignDesign Patterns - NuroHardSoftware EngineerCompare Locks and MVCC in a Versioned Store
Tests deep understanding of concurrency control paradigms by comparing pessimistic locking against Multi-Version Concurrency Control (MVCC) in a versioned key–value storage engine, focusing on version lifecycle, garbage collection, and read/write trade-offs.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteStorage EnginesConcurrency ControlMVCC - NuroHardSoftware EngineerImplement a thread-safe periodic job scheduler
Implement a thread-safe periodic job scheduler evaluates engineering fundamentals, trade-offs, examples, pitfalls, and operational implications in a realistic interview setting. A strong answer states assumptions, handles edge cases, explains trade-offs, and shows how to validate the result clearly.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OktaMediumBackend EngineerBuild and Review a Configurable Node.js Token-Bucket Rate Limiter
Implement a configurable Node.js Express token-bucket rate limiter with monotonic refill, HTTP 429 responses, code-review reasoning, and multi-instance limits.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OktaMediumBackend EngineerRepair an Express Authentication Endpoint Without Blocking the Event Loop
Repair an Express authentication endpoint with input validation, asynchronous bcrypt, safe errors, correct HTTP status codes, and event-loop-aware resource controls.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIMediumSoftware EngineerBuild a SaaS API-Credit Ledger With Expiring Grants and Late Events
Implement an API-credit ledger that grants, spends, and reports balances, where each grant expires and spending always draws from the soonest-expiring usable grant first, even when operations arrive out of timestamp order.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsitedata-structuresheapevent-ordering - OpenAIMediumSoftware EngineerClarify and Design Social-Graph Milestones
Clarify ambiguous social-graph milestones before designing follow and unfollow operations, consistent snapshots, and user recommendations. The discussion tests directed-edge semantics, snapshot guarantees, recommendation-policy choices, exclusions, deterministic tie rules, scale assumptions, and contract-focused testing.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardSoftware EngineerCount Events in a Trailing 15-Minute Window with a Fixed-Size Ring Buffer
Implement an event counter that returns how many events occurred in the trailing 15 minutes, using a fixed-size ring buffer of per-second buckets so memory stays bounded at any event rate. It tests circular buffers, stale-slot detection, window boundaries, late events and thread safety.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardMachine Learning EngineerDesign an Extensible Simulation Engine
This problem tests object-oriented design patterns and modular architecture by requiring the implementation of a simulation engine that remains agnostic to the specific rules of a two-player turn-based game.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteSystem DesignObject-Oriented DesignDesign Patterns - OpenAIMediumMachine Learning EngineerExplain KV cache in Transformer inference
This question evaluates understanding of KV cache mechanisms in Transformer inference, including attention-state caching, memory and latency trade-offs, and engineering optimizations for autoregressive decoding.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardMachine Learning EngineerExplain what torch.distributed.barrier does
This question evaluates understanding of PyTorch distributed synchronization primitives, process coordination, and concurrency control in distributed training workflows.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIMediumApplied ScientistExtensible card-hand ranking: three of a kind, flush, pair and a discard rule
A three-part object-oriented coding exercise built around a card game: rank hands by three of a kind, pair and high card, insert a flush category, then add a discard rule that removes hands that are not a pair, returning a log of each game. It tests extensible design, deterministic tie-breaking and absorbing rule changes cleanly.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardSoftware EngineerFault-Tolerant Work Queue with Leases, Fencing Tokens and DAG Task Dependencies
Implement a fault-tolerant work queue in which workers claim tasks under expiring leases, crashed workers' tasks are reassigned, and late reports from stale workers are rejected, then add DAG dependencies with cycle detection. It tests leases, fencing tokens, topological release and delivery semantics.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardSoftware EngineerFind a Hidden Number When Each Comparison Answer Arrives One Call Late
Find a hidden integer from 1 to n using a comparison API whose answers arrive one call late: each call submits a new guess but returns the result for the previous one. Build a correct search first, then reduce the worst-case number of calls. It tests binary search under delayed feedback and worst-case analysis.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardSoftware EngineerFollow Graph with Cheap Snapshots and Top-K Follow Recommendations
Build a one-directional follow graph that supports cheap snapshots and queries against past snapshots, then recommend the top k accounts a user should follow. It tests versioned data structures, snapshot semantics, two-hop graph traversal, heap-based top-k selection and scaling to highly connected accounts.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OpenAIHardSoftware EngineerGPU Credit Ledger with Expiring Grants, Out-of-Order Operations and Fast Balances
Implement a GPU credit ledger with expiring grants, subtractions that spend the soonest-expiring credits first, and balance queries, where operations can arrive out of timestamp order. Then avoid recomputing from time zero on every query. It tests event replay, priority queues and checkpoint invalidation.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite
MongoDB
NVIDIA
Netflix
Notion
Nuro
Okta
OpenAI