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Software Engineer Interview Questions

Software engineers write programs to design and develop computer software. Interviews are highly technical, so come ready to work through coding problems and math brainteasers. The specific questions you are asked will depend on what type of programming position you are looking for. Try researching a specific software discipline such as web development, application development, or system development.

Top Software Engineer Interview Questions & How to Answer

Question 1

Question #1: How would you describe your programming task process?

How to answer
How to answer: When answering a question about your process or life cycle for software development and engineering, it's helpful to consider every step, beginning with obtaining the requirements for the end product. Include as much detail as possible to help the interviewer learn more about any work you've done as a software engineer and how you handle a task to show your ability to tackle a project from start to finish.
Question 2

Question #2: Which programming languages do you know and prefer?

How to answer
How to answer: An interviewer will want to know what programming languages you're familiar with, as well as which languages you prefer. This question doesn't necessarily have a right or wrong answer, but it does provide insights into your capabilities and coding expertise. If the job listing for which you are interviewing includes specific language knowledge preferences, make sure to include them when outlining the software languages you know.
Question 3

Question 3: What is an example of a successful project that you completed?

How to answer
How to answer: When describing your success with a past project, it's helpful to identify aspects of the project that went well and detail the different task list elements. You can describe the team with whom you worked on the project, how you managed your time, and how you specifically contributed to the project.

419,267 software engineer interview questions shared by candidates

Given a single-line text string and a maximum width value, write the function 'string justify(string text, int maxWidth)' that formats the input text using full-justification, i.e., extra spaces on each line are equally distributed between the words; the first word on each line is flushed left and the last word on each line is flushed right.
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Software Engineer - Applications

Interviewed at LinkedIn

3.8★
Jul 31, 2012

Given a single-line text string and a maximum width value, write the function 'string justify(string text, int maxWidth)' that formats the input text using full-justification, i.e., extra spaces on each line are equally distributed between the words; the first word on each line is flushed left and the last word on each line is flushed right.

Imagine you have only two eggs and a 100 story building in front of you. Describe an algorithm (or technique) to minimize the number of throws (or tries) to determine where the egg will start to break when thrown off the building. If the egg breaks when thrown from that floor, it will always break from that floor or higher (i.e. all eggs have the same results per floor; they break or they don't).
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Senior Software Engineer

Interviewed at Adobe

4.1★
Mar 9, 2017

Imagine you have only two eggs and a 100 story building in front of you. Describe an algorithm (or technique) to minimize the number of throws (or tries) to determine where the egg will start to break when thrown off the building. If the egg breaks when thrown from that floor, it will always break from that floor or higher (i.e. all eggs have the same results per floor; they break or they don't).

Using some functions they gave me which operate with cells in spreadsheets, I had to compute sum of an array. Later I had to implement by myself those functions: the trickiest thing was to implement the part when some cell is a sum of two other cells and some of those two cells is a some of some other cells and so on ...
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Software Engineer

Interviewed at Jane Street

4.4★
Oct 18, 2015

Using some functions they gave me which operate with cells in spreadsheets, I had to compute sum of an array. Later I had to implement by myself those functions: the trickiest thing was to implement the part when some cell is a sum of two other cells and some of those two cells is a some of some other cells and so on ...

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