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I've worked at Microsoft, Adobe, and Twitter over the past few years. I've also received offers from (or interviewed with) Google, FB, Dropbox, Uber, etc. I wou

I've worked at Microsoft, Adobe, and Twitter over the past few years. I've also received offers from (or interviewed with) Google, FB, Dropbox, Uber, etc. I would recommend: https://www.pramp.com https://www.pramp.com - 1 hr online interviews where you interview someone and they interview you back. Go through ~20 of these to get really comfortable solving problems while talking through them. They also give you the optimal solution at the end. This will prepare you really well for the initial technical phone screenings. https://leetcode.com/ https://leetcode.com/ - collection of 700+ interview coding challenges. You should be able to solve any random medium difficulty question within 15 minutes if you want a shot at the companies you listed. Keep doing a couple of these per day till you get really good. "Elements of Programming Interviews" or "Cracking the Coding Interview" - Read through either one of these to get an overview of the interview process and what companies expect. Polish your resume - This is only important to get the interview. Once you are interviewing onsite the resume doesn't matter much. Here is mine to give you an example. http://joshcockrell.com/joshua_cockrell_resume.pdf http://joshcockrell.com/joshua_cockrell_resume.pdf Feel free to send me yours if you want some feedback.

creek567 9y ago
This sounds like a great advice! Any specific tips on getting the most out of Leetcode? For example. Should I do the questions on paper first, then the editor? Should I have multiple solutions to each (n2 and nlogn) if it exists? How do you guard against just memorizing the questions? I feel like if i can't do a problem and look at the solution, then going back to it later will be useless since I already have memorized the answer but not the methodology to solve it. Thanks!
- joshuakcockrell 9y ago
  > How do you guard against just memorizing the questions? I don't think you need to worry about this. A simple search for "binary search" shows 20 different questions. If you can't do the 1st bst problem and you look at the solution then that's okay! You have 19 more to try it on. Even if you do all 20 then come back in a month and try them again. There's no way you're going to be able to memorize that many variants. And that's just 2% of their entire set of questions. To really answer your question, I prefer to just hit the "random problem" button and see if I can solve it in 15 minutes with an optimal solution. If I struggle, then I just go read the solution (to understand how I should have solved it) and try a couple related problems to make sure I'm not just memorizing it and I actually understand the methodology behind solving it. Good luck!
  - marktangotango 9y ago
    This is how I used solutions manuals to ace calc 1 and 2 in college. I went through every problem in the book at least twice. Some people say 'don't read the solutions' but it worked for me, going back and testing myself to make sure I "got it" was the key.
- wingerlang 9y ago
  I've read "cracking the coding interview" over Christmas. One of the suggestions it had was to write the code on paper. Then write that exact code into your computer. Only when you've fully written it in, fix the errors.
hluska 9y ago
A theremin controlled Atari Punk?? That's fucking cool!! Did you do a write up about the project? If so, I'd love to read it.

creek567 9y ago

This sounds like a great advice! Any specific tips on getting the most out of Leetcode? For example. Should I do the questions on paper first, then the editor? Should I have multiple solutions to each (n2 and nlogn) if it exists? How do you guard against just memorizing the questions? I feel like if i can't do a problem and look at the solution, then going back to it later will be useless since I already have memorized the answer but not the methodology to solve it. Thanks!

joshuakcockrell 9y ago
> How do you guard against just memorizing the questions? I don't think you need to worry about this. A simple search for "binary search" shows 20 different questions. If you can't do the 1st bst problem and you look at the solution then that's okay! You have 19 more to try it on. Even if you do all 20 then come back in a month and try them again. There's no way you're going to be able to memorize that many variants. And that's just 2% of their entire set of questions. To really answer your question, I prefer to just hit the "random problem" button and see if I can solve it in 15 minutes with an optimal solution. If I struggle, then I just go read the solution (to understand how I should have solved it) and try a couple related problems to make sure I'm not just memorizing it and I actually understand the methodology behind solving it. Good luck!
- marktangotango 9y ago
  This is how I used solutions manuals to ace calc 1 and 2 in college. I went through every problem in the book at least twice. Some people say 'don't read the solutions' but it worked for me, going back and testing myself to make sure I "got it" was the key.
wingerlang 9y ago
I've read "cracking the coding interview" over Christmas. One of the suggestions it had was to write the code on paper. Then write that exact code into your computer. Only when you've fully written it in, fix the errors.

hluska 9y ago

A theremin controlled Atari Punk?? That's fucking cool!! Did you do a write up about the project? If so, I'd love to read it.