System Design interviews - When working for cloud companies

Amazon
maama

Go to company page Amazon

maama
Nov 20, 2021 15 Comments

Hello, I have a question about answering System Design interviews for people working in cloud companies. At work you maybe required to use your companies products for your projects and you maybe familiar with how these work. When doing design interviews, do you design using these products or use open source technologies? Eg. Kafka vs SQS, Cassandra vs DynamoDB.

Which approach is better? Please advise.

#amazonaws #googlecloud #azure #systemdesign #interview

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TOP 15 Comments
  • Apple
    dnsb253wvs

    Go to company page Apple

    dnsb253wvs
    Neither? When I do systems design interviews I use the underlying technology, not a product (internal or external). Occasionally if it’s something small I might just say “a simple key value store like dynamo.”
    Nov 20, 2021 11
    • @apple: can you share your learning path? Documents, books, references etc?
      Nov 21, 2021
    • Apple
      dnsb253wvs

      Go to company page Apple

      dnsb253wvs
      Work in AWS for the better part of a decade, that was basically my learning path. There’s so many different systems there internally it’s like walking into the library of Alexandria for system design.
      Nov 21, 2021
  • Microsoft / Eng
    L62/280K

    Go to company page Microsoft Eng

    L62/280K
    In my experience most (reasonable) interviewers don't care, whether it's core, open source tech or managed / proprietary one.

    You must be able to justify your choice though, and hold your ground when they fire questions at you. So don't throw random names when designing. Solidify your knowledge about 2-3 tools in each area and stick to that.
    Nov 20, 2021 1
  • Oracle
    elfenlied

    Go to company page Oracle

    elfenlied
    Something something load balancer something
    Nov 21, 2021 0