28 questions · from 5 interviews
Peoplestrong interview questions
Every question candidates reported from their Peoplestrong interviews, most frequently asked first. Each links to the write-up it came from, so you can see the round and how it went.
Peoplestrong coding and DSA questions
- 01
Binary Tree Level of Minimum Sum Subtree
Find the level of the subtree with the minimum sum in a Binary Tree.
Medium · From SDE-2 Interview Experience at PeopleStrong
- 02
Binary Search for Key or Immediate Greater Element
Implement binary search to find a key element or, if not found, the immediate greater element in a sorted array. If neither is found, return -1.
Medium · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | SDE2/1
- 03
Detect Cycle and Start Node in Linked List
Given the head of a singly linked list, detect if a cycle exists in it. If a cycle is present, return the node where the cycle begins.
Medium · From SDE-1 | Round 2 | PeopleStrong (DSA + Project + System)
- 04
Word Ladder II - All Shortest Paths
Given a beginWord , an endWord , and a dictionary wordList , return all shortest transformation sequences from beginWord to endWord . A transformation sequence must change only one letter at a time, and each transformed word must exist in the wordList .
Hard · From SDE-1 | Round 2 | PeopleStrong (DSA + Project + System)
- 05
Convert Number to English Words
I was asked to implement a function that converts a non-negative integer into its English word representation. The input number could be very large, up to 20 digits, requiring handling billions, trillions, and beyond.
Medium · From SDE-1 | Round 2 | PeopleStrong (DSA + Project + System)
- 06
Valid Parentheses
Given a string s containing just the characters '(', ')', '{', '}', '[' and ']', I had to determine if the input string is valid. An input string is valid if: open brackets must be closed by the same type of brackets; open brackets must be closed in the…
Easy · From SDE-1 @PeopleStrong | Round1 | Java Backend Developer
- 07
Minimum Length Subarray Sum Equals Target
Given an array of positive integers and a target sum, find the minimum length of a contiguous subarray of which the sum is greater than or equal to the target.
Medium · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
- 08
Number of Provinces (Connected Components)
Given a graph, find the number of connected components.
Medium · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
- 09
Detect Loop in Linked List
Given the head of a singly linked list, determine if it has a cycle in it.
Easy · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
- 10
First Unique Character in a String
Given a string s, find the first non-repeating character in it and return its index. If it does not exist, return -1.
Easy · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
- 11
Lowest Common Ancestor of a BST
Given a binary search tree (BST), find the lowest common ancestor (LCA) of two given nodes in the BST.
Medium · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
- 12
Longest Subarray with a Given Sum
Given an array of integers and an integer k, return the length of the longest subarray that sums to k.
Medium · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
Peoplestrong system design questions
- 01
System Health Monitoring
I was asked about designing a system for health monitoring. This included monitoring metrics at the host level (CPU, memory, disk, network), application level (p50/p95 latency, error rate, RPS), and database level (connections, slow queries, locks). I also…
From SDE-1 | Round 2 | PeopleStrong (DSA + Project + System)
- 02
Monolithic vs. Microservices Architecture
I was asked to explain the key differences between Monolithic and Microservices architectural styles, outlining their respective advantages and disadvantages.
- 03
CAP Theorem Explanation
The interviewer asked for an explanation of the CAP Theorem, requiring me to define Consistency, Availability, and Partition Tolerance, and discuss its implications in distributed systems.
- 04
ACID Properties of Transactions
I had to describe the ACID properties (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, Durability) as they apply to database transactions.
- 05
Reducing API Latency
I was asked to discuss various strategies and techniques to reduce API latency, including topics like caching, database optimization, asynchronous processing, Content Delivery Networks (CDNs), and load balancing.
- 06
Resilience4j Circuit Breaker Pattern
The question involved explaining the working of the Circuit Breaker Pattern, specifically in the context of Resilience4j, and discussing its practical use cases in distributed systems.
- 07
Design BookMyShow LLD
Design the Low-Level Design (LLD) for a system like BookMyShow, including classes, attributes, methods, and relationships.
Hard · From Interview experince | PeopleStrong | Java developer
Peoplestrong behavioural and HR questions
- 01
Handle Urgent Production Changes
Imagine a release is scheduled for Monday. On Thursday, critical, must-have changes are introduced that require 7 days to implement. How would you handle this situation to ensure the release proceeds successfully?
Peoplestrong other questions
- 01
SQL: Design Employee/Company & Max Salary
Design SQL entities for Employee and Company . Then, write a SQL query to retrieve the maximum salary from the Employee table, linked to a specific company.
- 02
HashMap Internals
I was asked to discuss the internals of a HashMap, covering its underlying data structure (array + bucket with linked list/tree), how hashCode maps to an index, collision handling mechanisms, the role of load factor and resizing, the equals contract, and…
From SDE-1 | Round 2 | PeopleStrong (DSA + Project + System)
- 03
SQL Indexes
I needed to explain different types of SQL indexes (Clustered, Non-Clustered, Covering, Composite), their advantages and disadvantages, and the underlying data structure used (B+ Tree).
- 04
Primary Key vs. Foreign Key
I was asked to explain the differences between a Primary Key and a Foreign Key in relational databases.
- 05
final vs. finally in Java
I had to explain the difference between the final keyword and the finally block in Java.
- 06
JWT Token (Authentication & Authorization)
The interviewer asked what a JSON Web Token (JWT) is, how it works, and its role in authentication and authorization processes.
- 07
Authentication vs. Authorization
I was asked to explain the key differences between authentication and authorization in the context of security.
- 08
@RestController vs. @Controller in Spring
I had to explain the differences between the @RestController and @Controller annotations in the Spring Framework.
Peoplestrong interview questions FAQ
What questions are asked in Peoplestrong interviews?
Candidates reported 28 distinct questions across 5 Peoplestrong interviews. 12 coding and DSA questions, 7 system design questions, 1 behavioural and HR questions, 8 other questions.
How difficult are Peoplestrong interview questions?
Of the questions candidates rated, 23% were easy, 62% medium and 15% hard.