Citrix R&D Campus Placement Interview Experience

Online Test (hacker Rank 2 hours): 40 MCQs on Aptitude, DS, Algorithms, OOPs, OS, and Networking.

2 coding questions:

1. Given an array of numbers return the max product of a triplet from the vector. (Constraint: In the triplet, two elements should be adjacent). The brute force approach resulted in half the test cases. I couldn't optimize it further.
2. Given an array with positive and negative values. Now you are a pawn and u can move either one step or a number of steps can be a prime number ending with 3.Return the max path sum to reach from index 0 to the last index. DP's approach just like the longest increasing subsequence in an array with more constraints. I could pass all the test cases.

My friends couldn't pass either completely but could pass max cases in both were also shortlisted.

30 people were shortlisted for interviews.

Round 1 (hacker Rank Code Pair 45 mins): General introduction followed me some questions on my resume projects and my interests and past internship experiences and challenges faced.

I was given a question where a string pattern was encoded into a matrix and then I had to return a string that I get on decoding the matrix diagonally. You need to be strong at string manipulations and basic data structures like arrays or vectors and basic STL functions would help you out a lot too. I passed all the test cases.

1. I was given a string I had to reverse each word of the string. I was asked for all different approaches and their complexities and why I decided to code my approach.
2. Then a simple puzzle 10 identical bottles of pills

20 people were shortlisted for the next round.

Round 2 (hacker Rank Code Pair 45 mins): This round was targeted towards testing me on my projects and my concepts around them. Then a general discussion of my approaches to my work ethics and challenges and how I feel about my projects what I could have done better.

The only thing that is helped me here honestly as I had some unique projects which I worked on while I was interning at a startup called EyeDentify Systems which work on products powered by deep learning and AI. I had some unique ideas for my academic projects as well which definitely came in handy.

1. I was asked to use the whiteboard and explain the inner working of one of my projects and how it works.

10 people were shortlisted

Round 3(hacker Rank Code pair 90 mins): Two coding questions 

1. Maxed contiguous subarray sum with a constraint. 
2. Find if k bookings possible with given arrival and departure times. But it was modified and made a bit tougher. I could solve most of the cases, and I was given time to pass all cases but I couldn't.

Then we moved on to Core CS questions:

1. I was asked multiple questions from process definition to virtual memory and segmentation.

Then I was asked to write an SQL query to find the third-highest salary holder in an employee table I used a subquery approach. Then some further projects discussion and some networking questions are pretty basic but need a thorough revision.

Finally, one of my projects talked about a recommendation system, and I was given the whiteboard to explain it completely from scratch till final design limitations.

Result: 7 people selected(4 FTE+ intern,3 intern). I was selected for the FTE+Intern role.

The intention behind writing this experience is to give you a general idea, although if u feel this is a tough job to crack, coding for 2 hours a day for 6 months could get me here.

So make a plan stick to it and good things will come your way. Make a group of 2 to 3 people to code with so you can discuss your approaches while you code which helped me a lot during my interviews. Putting your ideas out there and discussing your approaches with your interviewers do play a major role.

I would like to thank 

• GeeksforGeeks for experiences and all their coding approaches and last-minute notes.
• Interview bit and leetcode for providing me with a daily practice platform.
• Aditya Verma https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5WO7o71wvxMxEtLRkPhiQQ for his DP playlist
• My two coding buddies for providing me with different approaches and being constant support through this 6 months journey.