PolicyBazaar Senior Software Engineer Interview Questions, Process, and Tips for Experienced

Round duration - 60 minutes
Round difficulty - Easy

Two coding questions were given in the first round to be solved in 60 minutes.

Q1. 
Rearrange Array Elements Problem Statement
Given an array A containing 'N' integers and an integer m, rearrange the elements of the array such that the differences between the array elements and m are sor...read more
Ans. 
Rearrange array elements based on their differences from a given integer.
• Calculate the differences between each element and the given integer.

• Sort the elements based on their differences while maintaining the original order for elements with the same difference.

• Implement a function to rearrange the array elements as per the given criteria.
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Q2. 
Print Nodes at Distance K from a Given Node
Given an arbitrary binary tree, a node of the tree, and an integer 'K', find all nodes that are at a distance K from the specified node, and return a list of th...read more
Ans. 
The task is to find all nodes in a binary tree that are at a distance K from a given node.
• Traverse the binary tree to find the given node

• From the given node, perform a depth-first search to find all nodes at distance K

• Use a list to store the values of the nodes at distance K

• Return the list of values in any order
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Round duration - 60 minutes
Round difficulty - Easy

This was a technical round with questions based on DSA, DBMS, Computer Networking and project based questions.

Q1. 
Triangle of Numbers Pattern
Ninja is tasked with printing a triangle pattern based on a given number 'N' for any test case.
Example:
Input:
N = 4
Output:
   1
  232
 34545
4567654
Explanation:
The pat...read more
Ans. 
Print a triangle pattern of numbers based on a given number 'N'.
• Iterate through each row and print the numbers accordingly

• Use spaces to center-align the numbers in each row

• Increment the numbers in each row as per the pattern
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Q2. What is the difference between a web server and an application server?
Ans. 
Web server serves static content over HTTP, while application server runs dynamic content and business logic.
• Web server handles HTTP requests and responses, serving static content like HTML, images, and CSS.

• Application server executes business logic, runs dynamic content, and interacts with databases.

• Web server examples include Apache, Nginx, while application server examples include Tomcat, JBoss.

• Web server focuses on...read more
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Q3. How does the internet work?
Ans. 
The internet is a global network of interconnected computers that communicate using standardized protocols.
• The internet is made up of a vast number of interconnected networks of computers.

• Data is transmitted over the internet using protocols such as TCP/IP.

• Websites are hosted on servers connected to the internet, and users access them using web browsers.

• Internet Service Providers (ISPs) provide access to the internet f...read more
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Q4. Write a SQL query to find the nth highest salary.
Ans. 
SQL query to find the nth highest salary
• Use the 'SELECT DISTINCT' statement to get unique salary values

• Order the salaries in descending order using 'ORDER BY' clause

• Use 'LIMIT' and 'OFFSET' to get the nth highest salary
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Round duration - 30 minutes
Round difficulty - Easy

Typical HR round with behavioral problems.

Round duration - 60 Minutes
Round difficulty - Medium

This round was purely based on Data Structures and Algorithms . One has to be fairly comfortable in solving Algorithmic problems to pass this round . Both the questions asked were quite common and luckily I had already prepared them from CodeStudio and LeetCode.

Q1. 
Binary Tree Traversals Problem Statement
Given a Binary Tree with 'N' nodes, where each node holds an integer value, your task is to compute the In-Order, Pre-Order, and Post-Order traversals of the binar...read more
Ans. 
Compute the In-Order, Pre-Order, and Post-Order traversals of a Binary Tree given in level-order format.
• Implement functions to perform In-Order, Pre-Order, and Post-Order traversals of a Binary Tree.

• Use level-order input to construct the Binary Tree.

• Traverse the Binary Tree recursively to generate the required traversals.

• Ensure proper handling of null nodes represented by -1 in the input.

• Return the three traversals as
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Q2. 
Reverse Linked List Problem Statement
Given a Singly Linked List of integers, your task is to reverse the Linked List by altering the links between the nodes.
Input:
The first line of input is an intege...read more
Ans. 
Reverse a singly linked list by altering the links between nodes.
• Iterate through the linked list and reverse the links between nodes

• Use three pointers to keep track of the current, previous, and next nodes

• Update the links between nodes to reverse the list

• Return the head of the reversed linked list
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Round duration - 45 Minutes
Round difficulty - Medium

This round basically tested some concepts from Data Structures and File Manipulation .

Q1. 
Intersection of Two Arrays Problem Statement
Given two arrays A and B with sizes N and M respectively, both sorted in non-decreasing order, determine their intersection.
The intersection of two arrays in...read more
Ans. 
The problem involves finding the intersection of two sorted arrays efficiently.
• Use two pointers to iterate through both arrays simultaneously.

• Compare elements at the pointers and move the pointers accordingly.

• Handle cases where elements are equal and update the intersection array.

• Return the intersection array as the result.
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Round duration - 90 minutes
Round difficulty - Medium

 Around 65-70 people sat for the test. 15 people were shortlisted. It consisted of the following to be done in 90 minutes.

- 28 MCQs based on core CS 

- 2 Coding questions – everyone had different and random questions. Most questions were custom logic based (easy level) including some standard questions – LCS, LIS, topological sort.

Round duration - 60 minutes
Round difficulty - Easy

Interviewer was very friendly. It started with the standard – tell me about yourself / introduce yourself type of question. Then he proceeded and asked two coding questions

Q1. 
Remove Duplicates from a Sorted Linked List
Your friend has homework to complete. Help him by removing duplicates from a sorted linked list.
You are given the 'Head' of a sorted linked list. Modify the l...read more
Ans. 
Remove duplicates from a sorted linked list without adjacent duplicates.
• Traverse the linked list while comparing current and next nodes.

• If they are equal, skip the next node by updating the current node's next pointer.

• Repeat until the end of the list is reached.
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Q2. 
Course Schedule Problem Statement
You are enrolled as a student and must complete N courses, numbered from 1 to N, to earn your degree.
Some courses have prerequisites, which means that to take course i,...read more
Ans. 
Check if it is feasible to complete all courses with prerequisites.
• Create a graph representing the prerequisites with courses as nodes and edges as prerequisites.

• Perform a topological sort on the graph to check if there is a cycle (if there is, then it's not feasible to complete all courses).

• If there is no cycle, then it is feasible to complete all courses.
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Round duration - 60 minutes
Round difficulty - Medium

This round had only 1 question. The interviewer introduced himself. And he advised me to clearly understand the problem before proceeding.

Q1. 
LCA of Binary Tree Problem Statement
You are given a binary tree of distinct integers, along with two nodes, ‘X’ and ‘Y’. Your task is to determine the Lowest Common Ancestor (LCA) of ‘X’ and ‘Y’.
The LC...read more
Ans. 
Find the Lowest Common Ancestor of two nodes in a binary tree.
• Traverse the binary tree to find the paths from the root to nodes X and Y.

• Compare the paths to find the last common node, which is the Lowest Common Ancestor.

• Implement a recursive function to efficiently find the LCA.

• Handle cases where one node is an ancestor of the other.

• Consider edge cases like when X or Y is the root node.
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Round duration - 60 minutes
Round difficulty - Medium

Pretty Good Round. Fast Paced. We covered a lot of ground.

Q1. 
Binary Search Tree Iterator Problem Statement
Design and implement a class BSTIterator to perform an in-order traversal over a Binary Search Tree (BST). Your implementation should include the following me...read more
Ans. 
Design and implement a class BSTIterator to perform in-order traversal over a Binary Search Tree (BST).
• Implement a parameterized constructor to initialize the iterator with the root of the BST.

• Implement a method 'next()' to return the next smallest element in in-order traversal.

• Implement a method 'hasNext()' to check if there exists a next smallest element in traversal.

• Ensure the output is the in-order traversal of the
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Q2. 
Maximum Consecutive Ones Problem Statement
Given a binary array 'ARR' of size 'N', your task is to determine the maximum length of a sequence consisting solely of 1’s that can be obtained by converting at...read more
Ans. 
Find the maximum length of a sequence of 1's by converting at most K zeroes into ones in a binary array.
• Iterate through the array and keep track of the current window of 1's and zeroes.

• Use a sliding window approach to find the maximum length of consecutive 1's by flipping at most K zeroes.

• Update the window based on the number of zeroes flipped and keep track of the maximum length found so far.

• Return the maximum length ...read more
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Q3. 
BFS in Graph Problem Statement
You are given an undirected and disconnected graph G(V, E) having V vertices numbered from 0 to V-1 and E edges. Your task is to print its BFS traversal starting from the 0t...read more
Ans. 
BFS traversal of an undirected and disconnected graph starting from vertex 0.
• Start BFS traversal from vertex 0 and visit all connected nodes in sorted order.

• Use a queue to keep track of nodes to visit next.

• Keep a visited array to avoid revisiting nodes.

• Print the BFS traversal path as the nodes are visited.

• Example: For input V=5, E=4 and edges 0-1, 0-2, 1-3, 2-4, the BFS traversal will be [0, 1, 2, 3, 4].
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Q4. 
Dijkstra's Shortest Path Problem Statement
Given an undirected graph with V vertices (labeled 0, 1, ..., V-1) and E edges, each edge connects two nodes X and Y with a specified weight representing the dis...read more
Ans. 
Dijkstra's algorithm is used to find the shortest path distance from a source node to all other nodes in an undirected graph.
• Implement Dijkstra's algorithm to find the shortest path distance from node 0 to all other nodes in the graph.

• Use a priority queue to efficiently select the next node with the shortest distance.

• Initialize distances to all nodes as infinity, except for the source node which is 0.

• Update distances t...read more
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Round duration - 60 minutes
Round difficulty - Hard

Bar Raised Round. Definitely felt the difficulty.

Q1. 
First Non-Repeating Character Problem Statement
You are given a string consisting of English alphabet characters. Your task is to identify and return the first character in the string that does not repeat...read more
Ans. 
Identify and return the first non-repeating character in a string, or the first character if all characters repeat.
• Iterate through the string to count the frequency of each character

• Iterate through the string again to find the first character with frequency 1

• If no such character is found, return the first character of the string
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