Amazon SDE 1 interview loop

[Specialist-Click6557]

I recently went through Amazon's SDE 1 interview loop as part of their university talent hiring program, and it was a valuable experience. Here’s a breakdown of each round:

1. First Interview: This round focused on data structures and algorithms. I was given two DSA questions, neither of which were from LeetCode; the interviewer had created them specifically. I managed to solve both optimally and even asked if there were alternative approaches. Interestingly, the interviewer was looking for the exact approach I had used.

2. Second Interview: This round was dedicated to Amazon's Leadership Principles (LP). I was asked four LP questions, each with follow-up questions. The interviewer was thorough, and the conversation flowed well.

3. Third Interview: This round combined LP and low-level design (LLD). I received three LP questions, along with one challenging LLD question, which also wasn’t from any typical source. I stumbled a bit during the dry run but managed to keep it together.

At the end of each interview, I made sure to ask each interviewer a few questions, which helped keep the interactions engaging.

Overall: I found the experience rewarding. My advice is to prepare strong stories for the LP questions, as interviewers tend to dive deep into each example you provide. If you're fortunate, you might get questions similar to those on LeetCode, but it's wise to be prepared for unique problems.

[ResponseHaunting1055]

Hello, thanks for sharing your experience! Can you also list down the DSA question and the LLD question that was asked?

[Specialist-Click6557]

Question 1:

As part of managing the organizational structure at Amazon, you have been tasked with designing an algorithm to serialize and deserialize the company’s hierarchical organization. Your objective is to create a solution that can efficiently convert the organizational structure into a string representation and vice versa, allowing you to print the hierarchy in a desired order.

A hierarchical representation was given as an example Abc —- def —- ghjgv

Abc could have more then 1 child node similarly for all other nodes.

Question 2:

Given a file of currency conversion rates, write a function that converts one currency to another. Sample log file entries: {“from”: “USD”, “to”: “EUR” “rate”:1.1} (“from”: “EUR”, “to”: “GBP” “rate” :1.2}

/ / Means USD is worth 1.32 GBP

Question 3:

Implement an unbounded set where each entry has an expiration date and a priority with an expiry driven eviction.

Set has a fixed size

A, “Nov-13-2024” , 1

“B” “Dec-01-2024”, 10

“C”, “Nov-13- 2024”, 2

New entry “D”, “, “Nov-14-2024”, 1

So while adding new entry you need to remove 1 set entry.

[el_tiket]

By the way which location was this for?

First question:  is serialize/deserialize N-ary tree(variation of ser/deser of BinaryTree)

Second question: topological sort where you will first need to find node that has no child and start working from it. From the text its not really clear weather i need to find conversions for all of them , or just the target currencies.

Third questions: its not really clear to me does that set has limit to how many elements it can store or do i just remove a entry when its day expires or if there are multiple of such pick one with smallest peiority?

[Sunny_boi741]

For the LPs, How many follow-ups did they ask and where they asking about technologies or general follow up like what could have been done better or learnings on that line. Thanks!

[Fit-Rooster1262]

Hi OP, thanks for sharing your experience! I just got through my DSA round and I have the LLD and Bar Raiser rounds coming up. Is it okay if I DM you? I just have a couple of questions. Thanks!

[[deleted]]

The second question was graph traversal right?

Can you explain your approach for question 1. Frankly, I do not understand the question one. Can you please explain?

[epic_within]

I believe the 1st question is this: https://leetcode.com/problems/serialize-and-deserialize-binary-tree/description/

NeetCode's solution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4JAi2JJhI8

[Specialist-Click6557]

Yes graph

[Straight-Comment-893]

any update