Airbnb Front-End Interview Track
Can anyone help me understand what the technical portion of the front-end interview track at Airbnb entails? I'm completely unsure about how to prepare given that front-end skills can vary based on the type of work you've done and what you have worked with. I assume it won't be framework specific, maybe general JavaScript knowledge? Any tips or preparation resources would be greatly appreciated.
You will be asked to write small UI components during your phone screens and onsites over CodePen.io They don't restrict your choice of library, flavor of JS or CSS but you should try to use vanilla JS or just jQuery if you can help it. It doesn't say much of your skills if you can implement a simple component in React because a lot of the complexity is already abstracted for you. Very little JS trivia questions asked. They just want to see your front end coding skills. There will be one session on general coding in Coderpad, which is a LeetCode style algorithm question. I used Python for that question.
Absolute rubbish re the comment to only use vanilla JS. Use whatever FE framework you can work in most quickly. Practice in codepen is good advice. Not all questions will be codepen though. You will probably be asked to do something not FE specific in coderpad, so practicing there with leet questions is a good idea too. Some testers seem to care if you use es6 so probably good idea to use that if you don’t already.
I said it's recommended to do so, but you might know better being from Airbnb. I used vanillajs and I got the offer.
You can definitely use whatever framework you are comfortable with to answer our UI component questions. That will not count against you at all. That being said, you need to have good handle on JS for questions that don’t involve the DOM.
Understand javascript well. Have a good grasp of the browser Api's like event handlers, DOM manipulation, etc. Know how to write clean and reusable css /HTML. It's not as algorithm (leetcode) heavy as the regular track. But you will have 1 algorithm round (leetcode medium level). Good luck!
Thanks. This helps me narrow down what to try to focus on.
Be in a good mood, and a good person. Core values matter.
Thanks this is helpful. Curious to know the interview pattern. Is interviewer constantly monitoring/asking questions while you are drafting the solution or if he/she give you assignment and walk off so that you can concentrate on the solution. Can you shed some light on it?
I interviewed with Amazon for a web Dev position. I prepared for a typical interview (leetcode and design q's). It completely backfired as I was asked very specific and detailed HTML/CSS questions. Needless to say I bombed the interview (having only done fullstack for the previous 6 months and back-end prior).
I know the feeling. Bombed an interview at another company by just focusing on CTCI for 2 months and then barely had any algorithms questions. Trying to not repeat that mistake.