4 ms·

So I've always wondered about these leetcode interviews, having never suffered one myself, if you're given one you've seen before, are you still supposed to pre

by hanoz 6y ago

So I've always wondered about these leetcode interviews, having never suffered one myself, if you're given one you've seen before, are you still supposed to pretend you're working it out from first principles?

pmiller2 6y ago
I don't know what the interviewers expect, but, generally, your "reward" for admitting you've seen the problem before is a harder question to answer. It seems more in the candidate's interest to pretend to work out the solution than to be honest.
- smabie 6y ago
  Yeah, I've been asked a lot of leetcode questions and always pause for a couple minutes before the answer hits me in a "brilliant" stroke of insight. This con works really well.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - bradlys 6y ago
    You need to get advanced level tactics like one of my past coworkers. He told me he would purposefully go down the wrong path with a problem - to only later have "divine inspiration" just before the interviewer would interrupt him and try to give him a hint... He would raise his hand and exclaim, "But, maybe!" And then promptly explain and solve the problem. It was at this point that I realized I have no chance of getting into FAANG when I'm playing low-level tactics like just trying to just solve two medium problems in <40 minutes with the most optimal answer. :( (Or 1 hard problem in 30-35 minutes)
  - wolco 6y ago
    It would be more impressive if you solved it right away.
    - smabie 6y ago
      Nah it's too suspicious
pkaye 6y ago
Long time ago I go the "Why is a manhole cover round?" at an interview. I prefaced that I heard this question before and followed up with 3-4 possible answers. The interviewer was still impressed.
- daniellarusso 6y ago
  I have started asking this, since I have not heard it asked in awhile (like almost 2 decades), and it is interesting to hear the responses.
  - wyclif 6y ago
    It's clichéd question, but in my opinion it's a very good one and would still be useful if it wasn't so overused. The reason why is because there's one big reason why manhole covers are round and maybe 3-4 subsidiary and less important reasons why. A person who can 1/ identify that there's more than one reason, name them all and 2/ sort and rank the reasons correctly in order of importance reveals a person's clarity of thought and reasoning process.
    - daniellarusso 6y ago
      My initial intent, because I thought it was so clichéd, was just to get a laugh. But, I would say the majority had not heard the question before. This is a younger cohort.
- umvi 6y ago
  > Why is a manhole cover round? Easy, manholes covers are round for the same reason JavaScript is the most popular language. Answer: once round manholes became ubiquitous it became extremely difficult to make anything other than round manholes covers.
yodsanklai 6y ago
Others may disagree, but I think if you haven't seen the problem before (or a close variant), chances are that you won't be able to finish it during the interview (unless it's an easy problem). FAANG interview a lot of people and the bar is high. You're competing with people who completed tons of leetcode problems. When I started practicing leetcode, I underestimate the amount of work to be ready (they say that you should solve 100 problems, I think it's much higher, but obviously some guys are smarter than others...). That being said, I'm 50-75% of myself during an interview. I managed to fail at questions that I did several times before. The experience is also different from one interviewer to the next. You can have a guy who asks an easy question, provides help, and still give very positive feedback because he was happy with the way you communicate and explain your algorithm. Then you can have an interviewer (usually more junior ones) who asks a "trick" question that there's no way of solving if you havent' seen it before.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ThrowawayR2 6y ago
The standard practice is for the interviewer to explicitly ask the candidate whether or not they have seen the question before. More frequently than one would expect, the candidate will deny having seen the question before, zip through the solution, and then completely stall-out when they are asked to revise their solution to accommodate a very small alteration is made to the problem parameters.
mhh__ 6y ago
If you can act, I would just lie. It's only a job.
eesmith 6y ago
According to PhD Comics at http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=993 http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=993 - lie.

by hanoz 6y ago

pmiller2 6y ago

I don't know what the interviewers expect, but, generally, your "reward" for admitting you've seen the problem before is a harder question to answer. It seems more in the candidate's interest to pretend to work out the solution than to be honest.

smabie 6y ago
Yeah, I've been asked a lot of leetcode questions and always pause for a couple minutes before the answer hits me in a "brilliant" stroke of insight. This con works really well.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- bradlys 6y ago
  You need to get advanced level tactics like one of my past coworkers. He told me he would purposefully go down the wrong path with a problem - to only later have "divine inspiration" just before the interviewer would interrupt him and try to give him a hint... He would raise his hand and exclaim, "But, maybe!" And then promptly explain and solve the problem. It was at this point that I realized I have no chance of getting into FAANG when I'm playing low-level tactics like just trying to just solve two medium problems in <40 minutes with the most optimal answer. :( (Or 1 hard problem in 30-35 minutes)
- wolco 6y ago
  It would be more impressive if you solved it right away.
  - smabie 6y ago
    Nah it's too suspicious

pkaye 6y ago

Long time ago I go the "Why is a manhole cover round?" at an interview. I prefaced that I heard this question before and followed up with 3-4 possible answers. The interviewer was still impressed.

daniellarusso 6y ago
I have started asking this, since I have not heard it asked in awhile (like almost 2 decades), and it is interesting to hear the responses.
- wyclif 6y ago
  It's clichéd question, but in my opinion it's a very good one and would still be useful if it wasn't so overused. The reason why is because there's one big reason why manhole covers are round and maybe 3-4 subsidiary and less important reasons why. A person who can 1/ identify that there's more than one reason, name them all and 2/ sort and rank the reasons correctly in order of importance reveals a person's clarity of thought and reasoning process.
  - daniellarusso 6y ago
    My initial intent, because I thought it was so clichéd, was just to get a laugh. But, I would say the majority had not heard the question before. This is a younger cohort.
umvi 6y ago
> Why is a manhole cover round? Easy, manholes covers are round for the same reason JavaScript is the most popular language. Answer: once round manholes became ubiquitous it became extremely difficult to make anything other than round manholes covers.

yodsanklai 6y ago

Others may disagree, but I think if you haven't seen the problem before (or a close variant), chances are that you won't be able to finish it during the interview (unless it's an easy problem). FAANG interview a lot of people and the bar is high. You're competing with people who completed tons of leetcode problems. When I started practicing leetcode, I underestimate the amount of work to be ready (they say that you should solve 100 problems, I think it's much higher, but obviously some guys are smarter than others...). That being said, I'm 50-75% of myself during an interview. I managed to fail at questions that I did several times before. The experience is also different from one interviewer to the next. You can have a guy who asks an easy question, provides help, and still give very positive feedback because he was happy with the way you communicate and explain your algorithm. Then you can have an interviewer (usually more junior ones) who asks a "trick" question that there's no way of solving if you havent' seen it before.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ThrowawayR2 6y ago

The standard practice is for the interviewer to explicitly ask the candidate whether or not they have seen the question before. More frequently than one would expect, the candidate will deny having seen the question before, zip through the solution, and then completely stall-out when they are asked to revise their solution to accommodate a very small alteration is made to the problem parameters.

mhh__ 6y ago

If you can act, I would just lie. It's only a job.

eesmith 6y ago

According to PhD Comics at http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=993 http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=993 - lie.