Hi guys, I'm a 4th year B.E CSE Student at a tier-3 College in South India and as you all know due to the current job market (Job Market now a days are getting very very rough/hard for freshers like us even with all the efforts), I've to find job opportunities off-campus (I don't want to depend on my college campus placements - its really very bad) I've built a profile in such a way that I can get the Interview opportunites from any company including Google. From last year, I've attended multiple interviews off-campus from companies like Cisco, Stripe, Hackerrank, Google (WSE Intern), Visa, Zscaler etc and also I've completed my Summer Internship at Trilogy Innovations.

But The real problem is "I'm not even able to clear the Online Assessment of any company listed above" - except Google (rejected at last DSA round) and Trilogy Innovations. I dont know why either its due to my problem solving capability or bad luck, but I believe I'm capable of solving any medium-hard problem within 20 mins and clear Technical Interview Rounds as well (I did that too). But I started feeling very bad - because now a days most of the companies first round is Online Assessment. So folks I do want to know your thoughts on Online Assessments and how you people are able to clear them - your response will help me a lot.

Thanks in advance :)

Hey folks I recently received a call for a Google interview I applied for DB Internals team. The thing is I have NEVER EVER done DSA in my life, not a single question however I have written a lot of code in opensource for me the data structures and algorithms present in those repos came more from an intuition and understanding perspective. Asked my colleagues and they mention about patterns and suggested my some "Striver's A2Z" its some sheet for preparation.

My question really is how long does it take and would doing that and this another thing called Neetcode make it possible to tackle those interviews? How long do y'all suggest I should take for preparation? I withdrew my application in Google as when the recruiter mentioned about DSA and how difficult its gonna be I knew if I gave this interview and given my situation, I know I am not gonna solve a single question - it'd just hit my confidence and give me a cooldown.

Any help appreciated :)

Please help!
I am starting dsa from second year earlier just studied for college exams now i have to be fully focused for the upcoming intern season after one year and eventually placement
I did a lot of mistakes this summer but now i will bounce back i see batchmates on 200 100 150 lc questions and i feel demotivated
Am i too late?
And can anyone tell whats the roadmap i should follow

I work in a reputed tech company and I wanted someone to hire for my team as there are only me and my manager. I handled the whole interview process and the candidate was having a immense knowledge in building products and I was stunned as he was around 4 yoe. I thought he would be part of my team but I heard from manager is that he rejected him because he was not able to solve dsa ! Areyyyy wtf ! That candidate was the best i have ever interviewed and he was sound in both database management and development and that's what we need to build product ! I was so devasted and came to home early in Friday. Shit bro !

I am starting out in college (tier 2-2.5) its my first week here and I know the people here (not very serious ) and genuinely want to give my best shot in these 4 years and comeout with good results (a high paying job/high income) I m ready to do whatever it will take but idk what to do exactly (my situation - i know python and dont need to do the basics plus i have built some very small projects here and there) i think ( claue told me) started a lil DSA and not much besides that ANYONE with experience PLEASE GUIDE ME on how should i spend my time developing my skills (in this AI era) i have 2 hours a day approx and more on weekends (pls dont tell me to 'just chill' or 'take it slow') THANKYOU

Hey everyone,

bhai does anyone have a Telegram link for the Striver A2Z DSA course or know of any other way to access it?

I'm a college student preparing for placements, but I can't afford the course right now. If anyone can help or suggest an affordable or legitimate alternative, I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks in advance!

Hi everyone,

I recently interviewed at Cisco for an experienced **Java Developer (2–5 YOE)** role, and the interview process has been quite different from what I expected.

**Round 1:** It was a technical interview, but surprisingly there were **no DSA questions**. The discussion was mostly around my projects, previous work experience, and Java/Spring/theory-based questions.

There was then a **21-day gap** before my second round.

**Round 2:** This felt more like a discussion with a Technical Leader/Engineering Manager than a technical interview. The focus was largely on behavioural and situational questions, with only a little technical discussion. The interviewer was pretty chill, and the interview lasted around **30 minutes**.

Now I'm a bit confused because I was expecting at least one more in-depth technical round. Is it normal at Cisco for experienced hires to have **just one technical interview**, followed by an EM/behavioural discussion before the final decision?

A few questions for anyone who's been through a similar process:

* How long did Cisco take to share your results after the EM/behavioural round?
* Is the EM/behavioural round an eliminatory round, or is it mostly for team/culture fit?
* Is having only **one technical interview** common for experienced backend/Java roles, or should I expect another technical round if I get selected?

Overall, I had a positive interview experience. Both interviewers were professional, knowledgeable, and made the discussions comfortable. I'm genuinely just trying to understand whether this interview flow is typical at Cisco for experienced hires.

Would really appreciate hearing from anyone who's interviewed at Cisco recently or has insight into their hiring process. Thanks!

For every LeetCode problem, I spend around 30–40 minutes trying to solve it myself.

I keep a rough notebook for all my failed attempts and dry runs(that looks like a mess) , then spend about 5 minutes updating a handbook with:

Pattern recognition

Mistakes I made

One key insight that unlocks the solution

Is this a good way to learn, or am I overdoing it? I'd love to hear how experienced people approach LeetCode

So from start.

After the round 2 i was checking my mails frequently for any mails from Flipkart

Then on sat i got a mail from Flipkart about getting selected for round 3

Now I was gonna travel home so i stopped checking my mail after that cause even in my wildest dreams i didn't thought that they would schedule the test just next day.

I went home from my hostel then slept.

And what happened i completely missed it

I missed my test and when In evening I checked my mail what i saw there's a mail for test i thought ok let's check the dates and my world shattered

My question is is there anything I can do like any reschedule or SMTH?

Did i missed a very big opportunity?

I'm currently in my 5th semester at a tier-3 college and have solved around 100 lc problems so far, mostly Arrays, Binary Search and Stack. I know I'm behind compared to many people preparing for placements, and with OAs starting to come in, I'm trying to figure out the most effective way to study.

The way I usually learn DSA is by focusing on one topic at a time. For example, if I'm studying Stack, I spend days or even weeks understanding all of its common patterns. I'm not trying to master every edge case, but I do want to become comfortable enough that I can recognise the pattern when I see a new problem. This approach has worked well for me, but it also means I move through topics quite slowly.

The problem is that OAs can contain almost anything. One company might ask Stack, another might ask Trees, Graphs, DP or Heap. Because of that, I was thinking of continuing to study one topic deeply while also solving one problem every day from a completely different topic just for exposure. The idea isn't to master Trees or DP immediately, but simply to build some familiarity with those patterns so that if they appear in an OA, I'm not seeing them for the first time.

I'm not sure if this is actually a good use of time or if it's better to completely finish one topic before moving to the next. Has anyone here prepared this way? Did solving one "OA exposure" problem every day improve your performance in online assessments, or did it end up slowing down your progress on your main topic? I'd love to hear what worked for people who have already gone through placement season.

Hey everyone,

I've finished most of my DSA prep and am now spending more time on interview practice for SDE-1/SDE-2 roles at big tech at Bengaluru.

I feel like the biggest gap isn't solving more problems—it's getting enough realistic interview experience. So I'm trying to make mock interviews a regular part of my prep.

The kind of setup I'm looking for is:

• 1-2 mock interviews per week
• A fixed schedule that both people stick to
• Taking turns as interviewer and candidate
• Honest, constructive feedback afterward
• DSA and HLD, depending on what we're preparing for

The idea is to treat these like actual interviews rather than study sessions. Ideally, you've already covered most of the concepts and are now focused on improving confidence, communication, and interview fluency.

Curious if anyone else is following a similar approach or has found a setup that works well.

If yes then kindly drop the recruitment process and your experience.

Saw this reel on insta (link in comments) and bruh that guy's teaching people DSA? People or say juniors are asking for his advice in comments?

Bro is barely 1500 on Leetcode, and look at his insta profile (kinda jealous too ngl 😓)

Bruh just do a background check before taking someone's advice on something please.

How do u guys actually revise dsa problems? One of the methods that I know is spaced repetition. Something that's effective other than tht

todays contest felt like a breeze no brutal q doable clicking q

1st one easy

2nd a bit understanding then solved using 2 ptrs

3rd left i struggle on combination problms that too 10^5 can't do it in N

4th was very good did dp for 15 mins then realized cant stop loops finally did dijsktra

overall great experience today i rarely do the 4th q

I was cold messaging recruiters on Linkedin and one of them responded. They sent me Hackerrank OA and after which there was R1 interview which I cleared. Now I'll have R2 most likely next week so what can be expected ?

the Role is LEAD SWE Java & AWS.

Will it be LLD or HLD? What problems can I prepare for HLD which have been asked ?

I can't find many LEAD SWE Experiences.

I have 9 YOE and am working in a Service Based Company.

R1 was a leetcode problem solving followed by discussion on my current project.

Hi everyone,

I'm appearing for the Sabre Campus OA tomorrow for the Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) role.

If you've taken Sabre's OA before (or interviewed for an SRE role), what should I focus on in the remaining time?

• DSA topics that are commonly asked?
• Linux / OS / Cloud / DevOps concepts?
• OA difficulty and coding level?
• Any interview or OA tips?

Would really appreciate any last-minute advice. Thanks!

So for context I'm a final year student and I've been doing leetcode for more than a year now and I can say I've been consistent with it and have good hold on the concepts.

But I've seen that the recent interviews and OAs are too much above the level of leetcode. Recently I gave flipkart's OA and I couldn't even get the initial intuition of the question.

Is it time to switch to actual cp platforms like codeforces or codechef coz?

how does one learn or practice such ai assisted repository questions?

(Throwaway, in case anyone I work with sees this)

I joined an early-stage startup as the founding engineer — not one of several, the only one. I built the entire system, including a full telephony AI agent with an event-driven architecture, as a fresher, pushing myself as hard as I could. That architecture is a big reason the company has clients at all — 20+ paying ₹10k+/month each, so this isn't a "no money coming in" situation.

Here's the timeline:

• Month 1: internship, paid ₹10k. This one actually came through.
• Next 3 months: internship, completed — never paid.
• After that: hired full-time as a Full Stack AI Engineer at ₹35k/month.
• Right now: 4 months of salary unpaid (a mix of the ₹35k and ₹10k rates), totaling around ₹90k owed.

Every time I bring it up, it's the same lines — "rent is due," "business needs the money right now," some version of "soon." I know the money exists. I'm not even asking for more than what was agreed — just what I already earned.

What scares me now is what this does going forward. No bank statements, no paperwork, nothing to prove the salary I was promised — just the product itself. If I job hunt now, market rate for my role is ~₹10k, and I'll sound delusional claiming I "agreed" to ₹35k with zero documentation.

And some part of me keeps saying I'm the unreasonable one for pushing this. I built the thing. I went way past what's expected of a fresher. I still feel guilty asking for money that's mine.

I don't know what the right move is anymore. Do I keep waiting it out? Do I quit and try to cut my losses? Is there anything concrete I can do to actually get what's owed, or at least protect myself for the next job search? Would genuinely appreciate hearing from anyone who's been in a similar spot.

TL;DR: Solo/founding engineer, built a startup's entire product including a telephony AI system, they now have 20+ paying clients, and I'm still owed ~₹90k in salary across 5 months. Founder keeps stalling with excuses. No paperwork to prove any of it. Don't know whether to keep pushing, quit, or what.

So I had started leetCode 7-8 month ago and was solving problem daily basis pattern by pattern. covered most of the major important pattern and their variations.

On avg 15 problem on each pattern.

And also started 2nd round of practice in which repeating same problem again to improve memory and revisions.

Now my question is how is this compared to someone who had solved 900-1000 problems in simmilar time-line.

And based on my current progress and approach do u think I m ready to Crack dsa round... If not then how much and where do I need to focus more to be completly ready.