Interview Questions
Table of contents
This is the ultimate resource for mindtouch ui interview questions. If you can access this page and understand its contents, you are guaranteed a job (assuming you don't ask for Riddlin during the interview.)
Warmups
These are good questions to break the ice and get the brain juices flowing.
Count to 5 or 10 in binary/negative binary
Start off by asking them to count to 5 or 10 in binary to get the base 2 mindset.
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 => 1,10,11,100,1001,... etc
If the person doesn't know binary then explain how to compute the binary representation and try again. Potentially skip the next part.
Now ask them to count to 5 or 10 in negative binary, aka negative base 2.
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 => 1, 110, 111, 100, 101,... etc
| Base 10 | Binary (base 2) | Base 2 Info | Neg Binary | Neg Binary Info |
| 1 | 0001 | 2^0 = 1 | 0001 | -2^0 = 1 |
| 2 | 0010 | 2^1 = 2 | 0110 | -2^2 + -2^1 = 4 -2 |
| 3 | 0011 | 2^1 + 2^0 = 2 + 1 | 0111 | -2^2 + -2^1 + -2^0 = 4 -2 + 1 |
| 4 | 0100 | 2^2 = 4 | 0100 | -2^2 = 4 |
| 5 | 0101 | 2^2 + 2^1 = 4 + 1 | 0101 | -2^2 + -2^0 = 4 + 1 |
| 6 | 0110 | |||
| 7 | 0111 | |||
| 8 | 1000 | |||
| 9 | 1001 | |||
| 10 | 1010 |
Easy list/array algorithms
- Find X in an array
- largest/smallest numbers, or both
- all even/odd numbers
- squared numbers
- Traverse a 2 dimensional array and repeat above
- De-dupe an array while preserving order
Brain Teaser Warmups
- Given 2 jugs with capacities of 3qt and 5qt, measure out exactly 4qt.
- Given two ropes that, when lit, burn for 30 minutes and 1 hour respectively, time 45 minutes. The ropes burn unevenly, meaning the amount of rope left has nothing to do with the amount of time remaining.
- Solution: Light both ropes at one end. After the 30 min rope has burned light the other end of the 1 hour rope.
Meat & Potatos
Now get a good idea of the interviewee's technical prowess.
Even or Odd
Given an array of numbers, rearrange it so that a new array is formed where each number alternates even then odd.
Hierarchical Wiki
Given a hierarchical wiki, which contains a root page with many subpage, create an algorithm to do the following:
Choose one of these options to have the interviewee answer
- Touch/retrieve all the leaf pages (pages without children)
- Find the largest page, assuming each page has a page size property
Implementations
These problems should be abstract thinking questions. More about the approach/methodology to solving a problem and less on the concrete solution.
- If you had to implement a shopping cart/checkout, how would you approach it?
Stumpers
These questions should be used if the interviewee blows through all the earlier questions. These should be tough to solve.
- Tag page
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- What links here
