Programming Interviews Exposed: Secrets to Landing Your Next Job, 3rd Edition

Chapter 3

Approaches to Programming Problems

Coding questions are the meat of a programming interview and your opportunity to demonstrate that you can do the job. These questions are the heart of the process that most computer and software companies use to decide who to hire. Many companies make offers to less than 10 percent of the people who interview with them. How a candidate performs during the programming interviews is the main determinant of whether an offer is made.

The programming questions are generally difficult. If everyone (or even most people) answered a particular question quickly, the company would stop asking it because it wouldn’t tell them anything about the applicants. Many of the questions are designed to take up to an hour to solve, so don’t get frustrated if you don’t see the answer right away. It’s not unusual for each interview to explore just a single question.

NOTE These problems are hard! Some of the questions are designed to see how you handle a problem when you don’t immediately see the solution.