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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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- 11
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Showing 841–870 of 1208 results
- OracleMediumSoftware EngineerObject-oriented design of a fixed-capacity LRU cache with O(1) get and put
An object-oriented design question that asks for a fixed-capacity least-recently-used cache whose get and put operations run in constant average time and evict the least recently used entry when the cache is full. It tests class decomposition, data structure choice, recency bookkeeping, edge cases and awareness of thread safety.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OtherMediumSoftware EngineerBatch Concurrent Logs into Five-Second Windows
Batch concurrent logs into half-open five-second processing-time windows with atomic rotation, a single ordered emitter, late-timer handling, and explicit shutdown and sink-failure policies.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OtherMediumSoftware EngineerBuild a Queue Worker with Backoff and a Dead-Letter Queue
Design queue-worker retries with exponential backoff, durable delayed delivery, attempt limits, idempotent effects, and dead-letter replay, including AI-code validation.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OtherEasySoftware EngineerClean up all Docker resources
This question evaluates proficiency in Docker resource management, covering containers, images, and volumes and the ability to perform a complete environment cleanup.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnline Assessment - OtherMediumSoftware EngineerExplain RF/analog IC interview fundamentals
This interview question evaluates engineering fundamentals, trade-offs, examples, pitfalls, and operational implications in a realistic interview setting. A strong answer for Explain RF/analog IC interview fundamentals states assumptions, handles edge cases, explains trade-offs, and shows how to validate the result clearly.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OtherMediumSoftware EngineerTest Severity Filtering with Contract-Distinguishing Cases
Test severity filtering with independent expected results, inclusive boundaries, misleading message text, missing fields, empty records, and preserved order and duplicates.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - OthersMediumSoftware EngineerWrite a quarterly SQL report and a bash max-file script
This problem tests your ability to perform conditional aggregation in SQL for time-series reporting and your proficiency in recursive shell scripting for system administration tasks.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnline AssessmentSQLBashData Aggregation - PalantirMediumSoftware EngineerOptimize Coupon Selection Under a Twenty-Point Budget
Optimize coupon activations under a 20-point budget to maximize monetary savings while handling item/category stacking, savings caps, rounding, and tie-breaking.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnline AssessmentAlgorithmsDynamic ProgrammingBit Manipulation - ParadromicsMediumSoftware EngineerCompare RDBMS vs NoSQL and containers
Evaluates mastery of data storage and scaling trade-offs (RDBMS vs NoSQL), virtualization and containerization concepts (VMs, Docker), orchestration features (Kubernetes), and language-level performance optimization (Python vs C++).
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PayPalMediumSoftware EngineerDetect memory leaks in C++
This interview question evaluates engineering fundamentals, trade-offs, examples, pitfalls, and operational implications in a realistic interview setting. A strong answer for Detect memory leaks in C++ states assumptions, handles edge cases, explains trade-offs, and shows how to validate the result clearly.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PerceptyxMediumSoftware EngineerDemonstrate a Project and Defend Its Design
Tests your ability to present an end-to-end software project you built or led, defend key technical design decisions and trade-offs, and architect a forward-looking feature extension under live questioning.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical ScreenSystem DesignArchitectureProject Walkthrough - PerplexityMediumSoftware EngineerIn-Memory File System: Add cd and Relative Path Support
A multi-part coding exercise that builds an in-memory file system with directories, files and listings over absolute paths, then adds a cd command and relative path support to every operation. It tests tree data structures, path normalization with dot and dot-dot components, consistent error handling and safely refactoring earlier code.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PerplexityHardSoftware EngineerIn-Memory File System: Strict mkdir, touch, ls, rm, rmdir and a Command Runner
A two-part coding exercise to build an in-memory file system: first mkdir, touch and ls with strict path validation and no implicit creation of parent directories, then rm, rmdir and a function that executes command sequences. It tests tree modeling, error handling and working against provided tests.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - PersistenceMediumSoftware EngineerExplain Lazy Loading and Frontend Code Splitting
This question tests your understanding of performance optimization techniques in large-scale frontend applications, specifically how to balance initial load time against runtime latency.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteFrontendPerformanceArchitecture - PersistenceMediumSoftware EngineerReason About Indexes, Kafka, and Database Locking
Tests practical database indexing, Kafka event ingestion with idempotency guarantees, and row-level locking strategies to prevent concurrency bugs and deadlocks in an inventory and order processing pipeline.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteDatabasesPostgreSQLKafka - PilotEasySoftware EngineerExplain Python and Web Basics
This question evaluates foundational competencies in Python language semantics (list vs tuple, identity vs equality) and web fundamentals (HTTP vs HTTPS, CRUD and API concepts), assessing knowledge of data structures, object identity, protocol security, and how CRUD operations map to web services.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PinduoduoMediumSoftware EngineerTrace Java Static and Instance Field Initialization
This question tests the understanding of Java class loading, static initialization blocks, and the order of operations between class-level and instance-level fields.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical ScreenJavaJVMStatic-Initialization - PinterestHardSoftware EngineerAI-Assisted Coding: Add a Read-Through Cache for a Product GET API in an Existing Repo
In an AI-assisted coding round, add a read-through cache to an existing service so a product GET API calls ProductRepository less often, then explain the approach. It tests understanding a codebase before prompting, cache placement, expiry, invalidation and concurrency, and proving the change works.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerBuild an emoji blaster animation on iOS
This question evaluates a developer's skills in iOS UI interaction, animation frameworks, event scheduling and concurrency, performance optimization, and designing testable application architecture.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerDesign Blackjack Hands, Splits, and a Multi-Deck Shoe
This problem tests object-oriented design principles, specifically the ability to model a card game with multiple decks, complex state transitions (like splitting), and encapsulation of game rules.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical ScreenObject-Oriented DesignSystem ModelingGame Logic - PinterestEasySite Reliability EngineerFetch a Field from Two URLs, Extract Valid IP Addresses, and Rank Them by Count
A practical scripting exercise for a site reliability role: send GET requests with a required header to two URLs, pull a text field from each response, extract every valid IP address, and rank the addresses by how often they appear. It tests HTTP error handling, strict IPv4 validation, code reuse and deterministic sorting.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerGenerate Attribute Combinations
Explain Cartesian-product generation for attribute choices while preserving mixed value types and making ordering, duplicates, and empty cases explicit.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerImplement Hierarchical Region Access Overrides
Design and implement a regional access control system that handles time-based access overrides on a static tree hierarchy with out-of-order updates.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical ScreenTreeBinary SearchData Structures - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerImplement tap-to-infect color grid on iOS
This question evaluates proficiency in mobile UI architecture, grid data structures, connected-component algorithm reasoning, and state management concerns such as undo and memory/stack safety within the mobile app development and iOS domain.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerReason About Nested JSON Schema Validation
Design and implement a recursive JSON schema validator that checks nested objects and arrays, enforces required properties, and returns precise failure paths for validation errors.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteJSON SchemaRecursionTree Traversal - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerReconstruct an Itinerary While Keeping an Unspecified Variant Explicit
Tests finding an Eulerian path in a directed multigraph with lexicographical tie-breaking using Hierholzer's algorithm.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screengraphdfseulerian-path - PinterestMediumData EngineerSettle Shared-Expense Debts, Then Reduce the Number of Payments
A coding question about settling shared expenses: turn a list of debts between people into payments that leave everyone even, first with no limit on the number of payments and then with as few payments as possible. It tests net-balance reasoning, matching payers with receivers, heap usage, and judging whether a greedy settlement is truly minimal.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screen - PinterestMediumData EngineerSettle a Group Tab With the Fewest Possible Payments
Turn a list of recorded debts between friends into a list of payments that settles every balance, first with any valid list and then with the fewest payments possible, using net-balance accounting and a backtracking search over who pays whom.
Software Engineering FundamentalsTechnical Screengraphsbacktrackinggreedy - PinterestMediumSoftware EngineerTrack a User's Top Trending Viewed Pin Within a Sliding Time Window
A data structure design exercise: track the Pins a user has viewed within a sliding time window and, at any moment, return the one with the highest trending score. It asks for methods to add a viewed Pin, remove expired Pins and query the top Pin, plus the runtime complexity of each operation.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsite - PlaidMediumSoftware EngineerReason About Rate Limiting Under Memory and Throughput Pressure
Tests the candidate's ability to design a high-throughput, memory-bounded rate limiter using bucketed counters instead of unbounded timestamp queues, balancing concurrency, memory overhead, and precision.
Software Engineering FundamentalsOnsiteRate LimitingConcurrencyData Structures
Oracle
Palantir
PayPal
Perplexity
Pinduoduo
Pinterest
Plaid