Interview questions not in my language

Amazon lhzsg
Apr 29 10 Comments

This is the 3rd time I'm going through the Microsoft Online Technical Screening and every time at least one question is in a language I don't know. I already mentioned in my resume (and to the recruiter) that I want to interview in Java, but the first OTS had one question in SQL (which I've never worked with). The recruiter apologized and sent me another one. This one had the "find the bug in this code" in C++ (and it was all pointers which I really haven't worked with, because I've only worked with Java).
Third OTS again in C/C++.
What should I do? I don't want to waste my time or her time.

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 TOP 10 Comments
  • Microsoft xVeQ24
    Really sorry for this. Please dm me her contact and I’ll get you a java interview
    Apr 29 6
    • New / Eng rksh
      Wait they use Java at Microsoft?
      Apr 29
    • Amazon lhzsg
      OP
      Yea, these big companies have many teams that use Java and C++. They are the main languages.
      Apr 29
    • DocuSign i7pchBA
      Speak for Amazon with the java bit, msft doesn’t use it nearly as much as you’d think
      Apr 29
    • Microsoft pAhW56
      Microsoft is mainly c#, c++, and JavaScript/typescript. If you can write java,!you can probably write c#
      Apr 29
    • Amazon lhzsg
      OP
      Yes, C# is the closest among these to Java. But even of I understand it, it doesn't mean that I would want to do my interview with it. Every second is important during the interview and I don't want to waste that second trying to figure out the language syntax and semantics.
      Apr 29
  • Tableau / Eng
    ThePlague

    Tableau Eng

    PRE
    Microsoft
     ThePlaguemore
    You never worked with pointers nor sql? What did you study?
    Apr 29 2
    • Amazon lhzsg
      OP
      Do you really think what you studied at school would be enough to pass interview questions and find edge cases?!
      At school I've never taken a class that had SQL. At work I build software, and don't work with SQL. Our data analysts, data engineers, research/applied scientists work with SQL. We don't. They analyze the data, we build a system that works for that data. So no, I've never had to learn SQL because I never needed it.
      Apr 29
    • Amazon lhzsg
      OP
      Same with pointers. I code in Java, why would anyone expect me to know pointers (and their tricky edge cases) when I'm not familiar enough with them? Pointers are some concepts that are very common in C/C++, but not in java. One of the reasons Java came into the world was to get rid of the pointers' problems. (Don't get me wrong, they have their own cons/pros) So why are you surprised that a person whose main language is Java is not familiar with pointers?!
      Apr 29

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