Microsoft Interview + System Design (SSE)
Summary
Interviewed for a System Design role at Microsoft. The interview process included two coding questions and two design rounds. The candidate was able to solve the coding questions and provided solutions for the design problems, but the outcome of the interview is not specified.
Full Experience
Recently, I went through an interview process for a System Design role at Microsoft. The interview started with two coding questions. The first question was to determine if it's possible to reach from the top-left corner to the bottom-right corner of a 2D matrix within a given time T, considering some cells are blocked and movement is allowed in four directions. The second question was a LeetCode problem about counting subarrays with fixed bounds. In the design round, the first task was to design an LRU Cache, and the second was to build a travel booking site similar to MMT or ClearTrip. I was able to solve the coding questions and provided solutions for the design problems, but the outcome of the interview is not specified.
Interview Questions (4)
Given a 2D matrix matrix, determine if it's possible to reach from the top-left corner (0,0) to the bottom-right corner (m-1,n-1) within a given time T. The grid contains some blocked cells, and movement is allowed in four directions (up, down, left, right).
Design an LRU (Least Recently Used) Cache data structure that supports efficient insertion, retrieval, and deletion operations. The cache should have a fixed size and evict the least recently used item when the capacity is reached.
Design a travel booking site similar to MMT or ClearTrip. The system should allow users to search for flights, hotels, and other travel-related services, book them, and manage their bookings.