Oracle Interview Experience for Associate Software Developer | On-Campus 2021

Oracle visited our campus in early August 2021 for the role of Associate Software Developer for the CGBU vertical. The selection process consisted of 4 rounds. The cutoff was 7.0 CGPA and CSE, ECE and EE can only apply.

There were a total of 4 rounds which include 1 online test and 3 interview rounds conducted in Zoom.

ROUND 1(MCQ TEST): This was an MCQ round conducted on Oracle’s Assessment Platform with 92 questions and for 107 minutes. 

• There were a total of 4 sections, each had multiple sub-sections which had questions from various topics.
• Each sub-section has its own time limit.
• So managing your time effectively is the key to clear this round(Later in this article I will tell you how to do it).
• In some sub-sections, you may submit before the time ends and in other sub-sections, you may not even reach up to the last que.
• One more important thing about this round is you cannot go backward which means you cannot go from que 5 to que 3.
• Let’s suppose there are 10 que in a sub-section. Then in each que you can either answer it or skip it. once you answer a que, you cannot revisit it, So answer only if you are sure otherwise skip it for now. After answer/skip last que, you will automatically come to first Skipped que. Then you can answer it or skip it again. In this way you will move in cyclic order.

The sections were:

 Aptitude Test

Sub section                           Time(min)     Questions
Math Reasoning                          12             10
Data Analysis                            9              8
Persistence and Attention to detail      5              6
Programming ability                     13              9
Logical  Thinking                        8              6

Coding Skills(16 que  25 minutes no subsections)

Computer Science Knowledge 

• 17 que 15 minutes
• 3 – 4 subsections of OOPS, DBMS, OS, Data Structures
• MCQ  on BST, AVL tree will definitely come. Red-Black tree may also come.

Contextual Communication

• 3 sub-sections were there.
• Data comprehension, vocabulary etc.

     Total 35 students were selected

Tips to  manage time in this round:

• After reading a que, if you think you can definitely solve it in under 2min(depend on time and no of que remaining), solve it else immediately skip it without wasting your time. In this way, you will at least solve all the que which you know or are easy. After one Iteration, you can again attempt skipped que.
• Try to increase your speed of solving aptitude que before attempting test.

ROUND 2(Tech Interview): This round went for about 1 hour 30 min.

• Install an IDE on you laptop beforehand
• The interview started with a basic introduction. Then I was asked to explain one of my projects and I was asked some questions on it. Not much cross-questioning was done on project.
• Then he asked me about Inheritance, polymorphism, and other oops concepts. He was checking my conceptual understanding. Try to give a real-life example of each and every concept you explain. In this way, he will be sure that you really understand the concept in detail.
• A lot of cross-questioning was done on from his side.
• Then he asked about virtual pointer and vtable
• Hash table vs BST. why we use BST if we can search a key in o(1) in hast table.
• Explain operation of stack and queue and give real-life examples where they are used.
• Explain multiple and multilevel inheritances.
• If class C is inherited from 2 classes A and B and both has display function, then which class’s display function will be called if I write C.display(). Watch this video in case you dint know the answer (https://youtu.be/h3INeRqf2vU)
• What is problem with multiple inheritance.(Diamond Problem)
• Data hiding vs abstraction
• cursor in Database
• What will be the size of an object whose class has just 1 variable.
• Normalisation and Denormalisation
• Do you know linux ( I replied no and he said no problem)
• Detect Loop in Linked List(You will have to write its full code from scratch so go through it once)https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/detect-loop-in-a-linked-list/
• There are two threads one printing even no. and one odd no. Implement this in CPP.
• Find no of words in a paragraph (input should be taken from a file and not through cin function)
• A program has a global variable and a function. Inside that function, two local variables were declared and an object was created. Draw the memory diagram.

ROUND 3(Tech Interview): A brief discussion on my projects

• Your role in your project
• How did you divide work
• Did any conflict arise between team members during project and if yes how did you resolved them
• Why did you choose C++?
• advantages of CPP over C.
• Are you familiar with Linux Operating system ( I replied no and he said no problem)
• In which order the keywords of an sql query are executed. (ANS: First FROM is executed then WHERE, then SELECT then GROUP BY, ORDER BY)
• He Asked me this puzzle.  https://www.ritambhara.in/3-basket-puzzle-appleorange-puzzle/
• Another puzzle: https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/puzzle-9-find-the-fastest-3-horses/

ROUND 4(Tech + HR): A brief discussion about my projects

• Would you prefer to work in a team or alone
• A client wants you to design a product(like app/website), so what are the thing which you will ask him about it before actually start coding.
• Are you familiar with cloud computing.
• Some other HR que like hobbies etc.

Verdict: Selected

TIPS FOR CLEARING INTERVIEWS-

• They do a lot of cross-questioning, so think before answering a question and do not use very heavy technical terms which you don’t know.
• You should definitely attend PPT. Answers to many HR que are told in PPT.
• If you don’t know something just admit it. They don’t want you to know everything.
• They mainly try to check whether your concepts are clear or not so explain them properly and try to give a real-life example wherever you can.
• Prepare everything written on your resume.