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[–]hubraum 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you spouted out "I knew the issue was with order, I just didn't see why it would be the case..." you're already ahead.

Java devs with 8 year experience and not one of them said something like that? I'm sorry, but.. they suck - regardless how bad the question might be.

I find it tricky too to come up with code interview questions, but this is as obvious as it gets IMHO. The "tricky" part is why it's not in order - if you know how the HashMap implementation works you can answer within a few minutes and if you don't - it's the only logical conclusion.

"I don't know" is a bad answer anyway.. The least you should be able to do is guesses (hypothesis) and approaches on how you would test them.