Previous Position – Software Engineer II
Previous Organisation – Sabre
Location – Bengaluru, India
Years of Experience – 1.5 years of Experience
I applied through Naukri
Telephonic Conversation with HR (5-10 mins)
HR was a third-party recruiter from Prudent Solutions who was hiring for Spire. She first explained about the company and the work it does. Then she asked a few questions about the previous CTC, the expected CTC reason for the switch etc.
She said the interview process will consist of a minimum of 2 Technical Rounds and can extend to 3 depending on the performance.
- Technical Round 1 – Tech Discussion
- Technical Round 2 – Tech Discussion
Technical Round-1(Tech Discussion) : (30 mins)
We started with our introductions. The interviewer was a senior developer at Spire. Then we jumped straight to problem-solving.
Problem1 (Easy): https://leetcode.com/problems/two-sum/description/
- First, explain the brute force.
- Then optimized it using hash maps and implemented it.
- Ran a few inputs and everything was perfect.
Problem2 (Medium): https://leetcode.com/problems/rotate-array/description/
- The question had a slight variation, was asked to right rotate than normal left rotation.
- The interviewer asked directly to code the optimized solution with O(n) time complexity and without using extra space.
- Gave the optimized solution. He asked to run a few inputs and everything worked perfectly.
- Then, he asked a question if rotations given become significantly large, then how to modify the solution.
- I explained it using the modulo operation. He seems satisfied with it.
By then it was almost 30 minutes, I thought he would conclude but he continued further asking questions on multiple things about the previous project and JAVA. Some of them I could remember are-
- What is REST?
- Is REST stateless or stateful? Why?
- What is the difference between monolithic and microservice-based applications?
- What advantage do we get if we use microservice-based architecture?
JAVA and OOP Questions-
- How to make class immutable?
- What is the final keyword? Why some methods are made final?
- What is method overloading and overriding? If the return type is different but the parameters are the same do will methods be called overloaded?
Then he asked me which design patterns were used in my project in my previous company – I said singleton, factory etc.
He asked me about the factory design pattern. What benefit does it provide?
At last, he asked me to explain the meaning of O and D in SOLID principles.
I could answer almost all of the questions, a few of which I could not, but he was kind enough to tell me. Our discussion went for around 1 hr 10 mins. Then he concluded by asking if I had any questions for him.
Feedback: Positive, Got shortlisted for the next round.
Technical Round 2 (Techno Managerial): (30 mins)
Started with him asking me about my experience in the previous round. Then he gave me his introduction. The interviewer was the hiring manager with 12 YOE.
He explained to me in depth about the different projects under him the project for which I am being considered and the expectations of the role. Then he asked for my introduction.
After that, he asked me to explain the work and the project which I did in my previous company. Few questions about it-
- What is an MVC architecture?
- What is the difference between Spring MVC and Springboot?
- What advantages does Springboot provide?
- Some Spring annotations – @Autowired, @RestController etc.
He asked me to solve a problem- https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/reverse-a-string-without-affecting-special-characters/amp/
- The question was simple. However, I could not come up with a solution to it as I was thinking in the wrong direction.
- He said that I am complicating the problem, although it is straightforward.
- He reduced the problem to simple string reversal. I did that and showed the output.
He asked a few questions about the API(s)-
- What is the difference between GET, POST and PUT requests?
- What does API error code – 404, 503 means?
After that, he asked a few questions about my academic background – Matriculation, Intermediate, and Graduation percentages. Extracurricular activities.
He asked how I tackle a new problem faced in daily tasks.
Then he asked about salary expectations and previous CTC. He concluded the interview.
The interview lasted for around 50 minutes.
Feedback: Since it was the last round I thought I did well and was expecting an offer. But I didn’t hear from HR or the company after the interview. They became unresponsive over texts and calls.