Interview Prep /System Design advice needed

Mar 23 5 Comments

Hey everyone,

I initially thought it was a good idea to schedule all my on-sites in one week (Google,Amazon,FB,Palantir) since I plan to take that week off of work and also know all the decisions around the same time. I have been prepping leetcode for a few months now ( around 350ish) , and starting to get comfortable with hards, but mediums still stump me sometimes . However, my system design skills are very weak , i find myself binging videos on youtube and reading through sys-design-primer, but I still don’t feel comfortable with designing a system. Also my focus on system design has been taking away from my leetcode time , not to mention I have to also prep for Amazon’s leadership principles and OOP interview. FB has given me a product design interview option , which could potentially be easier than sys design , since my experience resonates more with that, but I have to upskill on system design anyways for Amazon, and haven’t found any resources tailored for product design.

Can anyone help me any resources offering a concise/organized study plan for sys design? Also should i optimize my studying for my top choices or should i try to keep my eggs in multiple baskets.

For example, I am tempted to choose prod design for fb and not study too much sys design , and lower my chances for passing Amazon.(Google doesn’t have sys design for early career)

#engineering #software #swe

TC -138k
yoe- ~3

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TOP 5 Comments
  • Meta
    qlSD16

    Go to company page Meta

    qlSD16
    Meta product design is something like design an API. You don’t have to do capacity planning and such. Think through the data model choices.

    Amazon system design for your YOE is also likely to be reasonable. I passed it with a YouTube video solution.

    Best thing for prep in my opinion is mock interviewing. Go ahead and take out a sheet of paper and time yourself talking through a system design problem. If you get stuck on an element, go look up a solution and it’s justification.
    Mar 23 1
  • Google
    hEmi52

    Go to company page Google

    hEmi52
    Yeah it gets tough only later on. I'm 10+ years, and it blows my mind sometimes what they think I would know. From probabilistic data structures, to network level details, cryptography, processor architecture and shit like that. And I don't even apply for a role that is specialized in any of those fields.
    And the big irony is if you work in FAANG all of big problems are already solved and chances of you working on one of them are slim.
    Mar 23 0
  • Oracle
    NALG82

    Go to company page Oracle

    NALG82
    Read that system design book by Alex xu. I am in same boat as you but this book has really amazing and easy to understand.
    Mar 23 0
  • System design is mostly experience.if u haven't done it it's hard to fake if interviewer digs deeper. At your level of experience just be honest upfront that I haven't implemented this but I have read this and my understanding of the concept is so and so. You shouldn't be asked tough system design choices anyway.
    Mar 23 0