
Ask HN: How do you prepare your self for a tech interview? - aherlambang
I would like to know how everyone here at HN prepare them selves for a technical interview? I know that reading Skiena's and CLRS book again is one also try to solve problems in papers in paper is another good one. Mind sharing the tips and how much time do you actually spend in preparing this?
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amorphid
Step 1. Be a good techie. Step 2. Interview at companies worth working at.

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aherlambang
Define step. 1 and how to be that 'good techie'?

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elmindreda
Read a lot. Do neat stuff. Show it to people. Repeat.

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Peroni
The best preparation doesn't involve studying detailed test examples or
cramming about the fundamentals you have become a bit rusty on since your
University CS days.

The ultimate prep for a tech interview or any interview for that matter is
plenty of rest, reasonable research on the company you are interviewing with
and getting a clear understanding of their expectations for the role you are
applying for.

Tech interviews aren't designed to test how much study and preparatory work
you can do, the most effective Tech interviews are designed to find out what
your general competency is with specific technologies and what sort of coder
personality you align to. The tests aren't designed to find out how good you
are in one specific circumstance, they want to gauge what calibre of code you
will produce should you work for them on a daily basis.

My advice: Get plenty of rest, stay calm, do your best on the day and if you
failed miserably then chances are you avoided joining a company where the
level of expectation would have led to unnecessary stress and pressure down
the line.

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wtracy
I'm very curious to see the other answers to this, myself. Some things I've
learned so far:

1\. Different companies often have very different interview strategies. If
you're interviewing with Google or Microsoft, you need to be mentally on your
toes and able to solve programming problems and maybe some puzzles. If you're
interviewing for a developer position at a large bank, the experience is
completely different.

2\. Don't focus on getting "the right answer" to the exclusion of everything
else. You're not taking a standardized test--you're talking to a human being.
Sometimes demonstrating _interest_ will take you farther than being able to
answer correctly all the obscure questions that get thrown at you.

If there's anything to take away from this in terms of how to prepare, I'd say
its that being alert and engaged is just as important as knowing your stuff.
Staying up the night before trying to memorize design patterns is likely to be
counterproductive.

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raviksharma
I don't think you are supposed to "prepare".

Make sure interviewer understands what you already know or can learn quickly
if its something specific that job requires.

If you have to prepare for that role.. you are probably not a good fit. move
on...

*Of course its a different matter altogether if you are fresh out of school.

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scas
Sometimes I'll skim the documentation on a certain technology if I expect I'll
be asked on it, but most of the time I don't really do any sort of
preparations. My experiences cover a lot of the technical questions I'm asked,
so I usually have a quick answer.

