Data Engineer Interview Questions

Nicola R. - "You shouldn't hire me if you're looking for someone to simply write code in large volumes without considering the bigger picture. I'm someone who thrives on solving root problems, building, cohesive systems, and ensuring stakeholder alignment. If the priority is speed over thoughtful analysis, I might not be the best fit. However, if you're looking for someone who can drive meaningful and scalable solutions, collaborate effectively, and contribute to long-term success, then I believe I'd bring s"See full answer

Sreenisha S. - "Let me tell you about a time where a website I managed suddenly showed slow performance and the mistake on our side was it was unnoticed until a user reported the issue to management. As a PM for that project, I took full responsibility of the situation and worked with the engineering team to quickly resolve it. This mistake taught me the importance of focusing and monitoring non functional requirements as well in addition to new feature development /adoption where I was mostly spending my time"See full answer

叶 路. - "from collections import deque def updateword(words, startword, end_word): if end_word not in words: return None # Early exit if end_word is not in the dictionary queue = deque([(start_word, 0)]) # (word, steps) visited = set([start_word]) # Keep track of visited words while queue: word, steps = queue.popleft() if word == end_word: return steps # Found the target word, return steps for i in range(len(word)): "See full answer

Ross B. - "I most want to communicate a few principals of conflict resolution that I believe were integral in this situation, which are mutual respect, a results orientation, an unwavering focus on the user. To that end, here’s how I’d like to structure this answer: First, I’ll tell you about the project we were working on, to provide some background for you. Second, I’ll describe the disagreement. Third, I’ll describe how we arrived at a solution, and finally, I’ll discuss how those 3 conflict resolut"See full answer

Tracy M. - "ingestion, processing & storage layer to handle document processing client ->API gateway/entry point->object storage-> queue-> worker-> database data flow: client initiates document upload + status processing API gateway (upload endpoint: authenticates & authorizes request, creates pre-assigned url to upload document); status endpoint object storage - stores uploaded document unstructured data (images, pdfs, docx etc) via preassigned url Message queue to decouple ingestion from proc"See full answer

Ravi K. - "select e.firstname as firstname, m.salary as manager_salary from employees e join employees m on e.manager_id = m.id where e.salary > m.salary; `"See full answer

Yeshwanth D. - "Was this for an entry level engineer role?"See full answer

KAI - "Answer: select fromcaller, count(DISTINCT tocallee) as num_calls from calls group by fromcaller having count(DISTINCT tocallee) >= 3 Setup: CREATE TABLE calls ( from_caller VARCHAR(20), to_callee VARCHAR(20) ); INSERT INTO calls (fromcaller, tocallee) VALUES ('Alice', 'Bob'), ('Charlie', 'Dave'), ('Alice', 'Frank'), ('Charlie', 'Heidi'), ('Charlie', 'Judy'); "See full answer

Bipin R. - "As you know, this is the most important question for any interview. Here is a structure I like to follow, Start with 'I'm currently a SDE/PM/TPM etc with XYZ company.... ' Mention how you got into PM/TPM/SDE field (explaining your journey) Mention 1 or 2 accomplishments Mention what you do outside work (blogging, volunteer etc) Share why are you looking for a new role Ask the interviewer if they have any questions or will like to dive deep into any of your experience"See full answer

Ayinde B. - "I was working for my friend building streams at venues across the Chicago land area for FGC (fighting game tournaments), I adjusted and engineered his equipment to be set up permanently that's until covid came around at least. I used OBS to give visual appearances to stream watchers. So we're talking about subscribe, follow, and donation notifications and things of that nature for viewers to know they contributed in one of those ways. I set up proper sign-up scheduling for participants to lock t"See full answer

Salome L. - "SELECT MIN(id) AS id, TRIM(LOWER(email)) AS cleaned_email FROM users GROUP BY cleaned_email ORDER BY id `"See full answer

Anonymous Roadrunner - "def is_palindrome(s: str) -> bool: new = '' for a in s: if a.isalpha() or a.isdigit(): new += a.lower() return (new == new[::-1]) debug your code below print(is_palindrome('abcba')) `"See full answer

Malay K. - "For any project based questions, it is important to structure your response clearly, showcasing your thought process, technical skills, problem-solving abilities, and how your work added value. Besides the STAR method, you can also use this kind of framework: 1. Start by selecting a relevant project (related to the role) Give the project background and what specific problem it solved. 2. Align the project's objective and your role Be specific about your role: were you the le"See full answer

Richard W. - "int getMaxWater(vector& nums) { int n = nums.size(); int mx = INT_MIN; int i=0, j=n-1; while(i<j) { int water = (j - i) * min(nums[i], nums[j]); mx = max(mx, water); if(nums[i] < nums[j]){ i++; } else { j--; } } return mx; } `"See full answer

Alfred O. - "We can use dictionary to store cache items so that our read / write operations will be O(1). Each time we read or update an existing record, we have to ensure the item is moved to the back of the cache. This will allow us to evict the first item in the cache whenever the cache is full and we need to add new records also making our eviction O(1) Instead of normal dictionary, we will use ordered dictionary to store cache items. This will allow us to efficiently move items to back of the cache a"See full answer

Astro S. - "What are they looking for in the answer? "See full answer

Sreeram reddy B. - "user table - with userid, username, email, phonenumber, accountcreateddate exercises table - types of exercises - indoor walk, outdoor walk, running, stairs, cycling, swimming etc - exerciseid, exercisetype date table - date, day, month, year - with dateid Session table - userid, sessiondateid(linked to dateid in date table), exerciseid, distance covered, calories spent, starttime, endtime "See full answer

David I. - "WITH filtered_posts AS ( SELECT p.user_id, p.issuccessfulpost FROM post p WHERE p.postdate >= '2023-11-01' AND p.postdate < '2023-12-01' ), post_summary AS ( SELECT pu.user_type, COUNT(*) AS post_attempt, SUM(CASE WHEN fp.issuccessfulpost = 1 THEN 1 ELSE 0 END) AS post_success FROM filtered_posts fp JOIN postuser pu ON fp.userid = pu.user_id GROUP BY pu.user_type ) SELECT user_type, post_success, post_attempt, CAST(postsuccess AS FLOAT) / postattempt AS postsuccessrate FROM po"See full answer

VContaineers - " Compare alternate houses i.e for each house starting from the third, calculate the maximum money that can be stolen up to that house by choosing between: Skipping the current house and taking the maximum money stolen up to the previous house. Robbing the current house and adding its value to the maximum money stolen up to the house two steps back. package main import ( "fmt" ) // rob function calculates the maximum money a robber can steal func maxRob(nums []int) int { ln"See full answer