10 interview questions in IT companies: can you pass?

Learning programming for children is a pathway to a future where logic, creativity, and analytical thinking open doors to leading IT companies. Companies like Apple, Google, and Microsoft no longer rely on standard questions about experience or recommendations during interviews. Now, candidates are assessed with logic and intuition tasks that allow recruiters to discover their ability to solve problems in unconventional ways. Here are a few examples of questions used in interviews to evaluate applicants’ skills.

What Candidates Solve at Apple

Programmers interviewing at Apple face logic problems and higher-level math tasks. Some are simple, while others require understanding specific mechanisms. Here is an example of a logic puzzle used to assess critical thinking.

• Logic Problem: Sherlock is near the finish line in a game and faces a choice—two rooms lie before him. One hides countless treasures, while the other holds a monster. Each room is guarded by a watchman: one always tells the truth, and the other always lies. Sherlock doesn’t know which is which. He can ask only one question to determine where the treasure lies.

Answer: Sherlock can ask any guard, “In which room does the other guard think the treasure lies?” If he asks the liar, the answer will point to the dangerous room, since the truthful guard would indicate the correct one. If he asks the truthful guard, the answer will also point to the monster room, as the liar would answer. Thus, Sherlock should choose to go to the opposite room to find the treasure.

What Candidates Solve at Google

• Survival Challenge: Imagine you are shrunk to 10,000 times smaller and placed in a blender that will turn on in one minute. Your body has the same density, and your mass is reduced proportionally. How will you survive?

Answer:
*This is a real interview question, and here are a few popular responses

• Hug the bottom to avoid the blades.
• Stay near the blade’s hub, where there’s enough space to stay safe.
• Climb up the blade to the rotation axis where the force is weaker.
• Climb up the blender wall.
• Call for rescue or ask a friend for help.
• Use clothes as a rope to climb out of the blender.
• Try to block the blade mechanism.
• Jump out of the blender like a fly.

Google recruiters noted answers 4 and 8 as the most creative. Since you are shrunk down 10,000 times, your weight is significantly reduced, and with some physics knowledge, you might attempt to jump over the blender walls.

What Candidates Solve at Microsoft

• Problem with Pots: You have two pots: one 5-liter and one 3-liter pot, and an unlimited water supply. How do you measure out exactly 4 liters?

Answer: Fill the 5-liter pot and pour water into the 3-liter pot until it’s full. Now, 2 liters remain in the large pot. Empty the 3-liter pot, fill the 5-liter pot again, and pour into the small one until it has 1 liter since there are already 2. This leaves exactly 4 liters in the large pot.

• Problem with Shoelaces: You have two shoelaces, each burning for exactly one hour. How do you measure 45 minutes?

Answer: Light one shoelace from both ends and the other from one end. When the first burn out, 30 minutes have passed. Now light the second shoelace from both ends: it will burn for another 15 minutes. Altogether, this gives exactly 45 minutes.

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Tasks for other IT companies

Microsoft, Google, and Apple aren’t the only companies using logic problems to evaluate candidates. Similar tests are employed by many others, and here is another example of a question that might help you pass an IT company interview.

• Problem with Numbers: How many numbers from 1 to 1,000 contain at least one digit 3?

Answer: There are 271 such numbers. The count can be done in two ways:

Count the numbers from 300 to 399—exactly 100 numbers here. Add all numbers with 3 in the tens place, such as from 30 to 39, 130-139, and so on. Add numbers ending in 3 to the result. Another method: count the numbers without any 3. You get 729 if you take 9 cubed (all digits except 3). Subtract 729 from 1,000, and you get 271.

Logic challenges can determine your chances for a dream job in an IT company. Learning programming for children can also help them develop analytical thinking and prepare for similar challenges in the future. And they can master programming through courses at GoMother IT School. We offer online and in-person classes for various ages and skill levels. The first lesson is free, so feel free to try at a time that suits you.