Nutanix Interview Experience for System Reliability Engineer Intern (On-Campus)

Nutanix came to NITTE MEENAKSHI INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY for hiring Interns for SRE role . Out of 200 students registered 3 were selected and I am one of those to be offered for this role . I am writing this so that anyone who is preparing for this role can take this up as reference . I hope my article helps you in getting hired.

MUST KNOW

This role is strictly non-coding round , it is more related to troubleshooting , cloud, debugging and networks , so if you are one of the person who doesn’t like coding this can be a good option.

Topics to prepare –

• NETWORKS
• LINUX
• CLOUD COMPUTING
• OPERATING SYSTEM
• VIRTUALIZATION
• BASIC HARDWARE

ROUND 1 TECHNICAL

The first round is an online MCQ based test around 50 questions in 60 minutes, topics were the same as above.

Protocols , Linux command syntax , terms, full forms , basic hardware storage device ,IPv4 IPv6 ,

terminologies in Operating system . Some basic True False , some were more than one correct.

Go through Sanfoundary website questions of the same topics that helped me a lot.

Out of 200 around 40 students were selected for the next round.

ROUND 2 TECHNICAL INTERVIEW

• The interview round of Nutanix are very good , they ask in depth questions and practical simulation and scenario based to check whether you really know the concept.
• Introduce yourself
• I was asked about linux first , chmod command varaitions in it , R (recurssive) command , what is shell , where are the ip addresses stored in human readable form in linux .
• difference between http and https (make sure you know how https works)
• some scenario based question on SSH
• Questions on virtualization like can the guest machine have more memory than the host machine how
• networking commands like PING , traceroute , ipconfig not direct connected it with scenario based question.
• NTP (network time protocol ) I was not aware of this so I straightforward told .
• some question related to DHCP
• difference between HDD and SSD
• Have you done virtualization anywhere ?
• Basics of cloud what will you do when there is a crash in your system basically troubleshooting
• What is your primary goal in life
• Tip : Make basics Strong so even if you don’t know a question you can frame its basics around it.

I was selected for this round

ROUND 3 TECHNICAL INTERVIEW ROUND

My first round was a good round since I was able to answer almost all questions and those I did not know i said I am not aware of it , this helped me from creating unnecessary confusion in mind. for me third technical interview round was skipped and I was directly sent to HR round .

Round 4 HR Round

This was my first offline interview and was most amazing , the person interviewing was from the support team of NUTANIX .

• Introduce yourself , your family background , why choose engineering , why come computer science , why not go for masters , what is the other thing you would like to do other than this job
• Standard HR round questions this you can find on interviewbit.
• Some situation based questions to analyse your realtime ability to think of solution ( real-life not from syllabus)
• They want to know you as a person so be honest and humble
• Explain OSI model to a person who never heard of networks
• One of my project was on AWS so they asked questions related to that and asked me to draw a high level – architecture of it .
• They asked why not development and why SRE .
• Troubleshooting of system , A printer is not working properly how will you troubleshoot same goes for a coffee machine

This round was quite satisfying , I answered with a good confidence and created a good communication with them .

RESULTS

In the end results were announced and I was shortlisted with two others, I couldn’t be more happy for this .

RESOURCES

I prepared for this drive from various resources which proved beneficial for me . Linking them here for you !

Computer Networks + linux(network ) commands – Gate smashers Playlist on Youtube

Animated Videos for better understanding – PowerCert Animated Videos (include Virtualization also )

Cloud Computing – aws skill builder cloud practitioner course (Only the basics till 4th module is enough)

Operating System – Gate smashers Playlist on Youtube or if you are good at it you can just watch 1 shot video thats enough as not much questions were asked from OS.

General linux command – I did this from a udemy course but you can find on youtube as well

https://www.sanfoundry.com/computer-network-questions-answers/ and for all other topic mcqs

https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/nutanix-interview-experience-for-system-reliability-engineer/ This interview experience helped me a lot .

https://www.interviewbit.com/sre-interview-questions/#what-is-sre MUST READ

TIPS

Apart from this learn what HYPERCONVERGENCE is as it is what NUTANIX works upon

Make notes so that you can keep revising them

commands and port numbers are neccessary

Do not panic in interview as it is 70% confidence and 30% of what you have learnt

learn how protocols work at each layer and how all are connected they ask very basic but modulated scenario based question on this .

Communication and Confidence is the key.

learn about virtualization and servers and basic understanding of cloud .