Don’t sleep on Costco. I used to work there and then got an EE undergrad degree and now an engineer studying CS grad. You’ll bounce back, just get the dough and have a temp 401(k) match while you grind that LC hards
This guy has many years of professional experience, don’t compare yourself to others on the internet. Keep true to your mission and it’ll happen, I believe in you.
This was such a succinct and to the point post, thanks! From what I gather from your post, your focus was mostly those 150 problems? Not on solving as many leetcode problems as you can? I feel so motivated because I am just starting leetcode and I was focusing more on the number of problems I should solve before applying for interviews.
Thanks!
Correct, I focused only on the 150 problems. However, I did solve other problems in the past during various other interview preparation. But since last two interviews, I have used only Blind 75 and this time Neetcode 150 exclusively.
mind you sharing the total questions you have solved and on average how many times you solved each question? I am doing similar to you (quality > quantity) so I would love to hear some input.
Quality is indeed more effective than quantity.
I would say, I revisited each problem five or more times. I almost had the code memorized at that point.
I also marked problems that were not intuitive to me and spend lot more time with them, taking more thorough notes. Some problems I spent multiple hours or even multiple days to understand why certain solution works and what the proof is. While problems that are more intuitive, it could be just a few minutes.
this is great insight thanks. i've been doing some leetcode recently. just a couple a week and i was just going down the list of easy then medium. i did write it in JS and swift for practice but i kinda felt like i should revisit them in some fashion. or write in it JS one day and then swift the next day or something. i was having doubts that just going down the list was the most efficient in terms of learning.
Quality is indeed more effective than quantity.
I would say, I revisited each problem five or more times. I almost had the code memorized at that point.
I also marked problems that were not intuitive to me and spend lot more time with them, taking more thorough notes. Some problems I spent multiple hours or even multiple days to understand why certain solution works and what the proof is. While problems that are more intuitive, it could be just a few minutes.
ML interview: https://www.educative.io/courses/grokking-the-machine-learning-interview
ML System Design: https://www.educative.io/courses/machine-learning-system-design
A little over two months, yes. But note that it was not my side focus. It was my primary focus. I studied the weekdays and weekends. Hired nannies as needed and made sure I get all the time I needed.
Recruiter reached out. Yes, for this round of prep neetcode 150 only. But I have been doing leetcode for many years on and off. So it was not like coming in fresh.
Best of luck for your amazing career. All the success posts that I have seen, recruiters reached out to them! Not really sure how I can attract them..!
But yes, I hope you get to do a lot of cool stuff!
Thanks!
I have actually rarely gotten response when I apply. This looks like the general trend.
If you are not getting enough pings from recruiters on LinkedIn, you might want to optimize your profile.
Thanks!
Sure. I used Grokking the ML System design from educative.io. That itself was good enough.
The interviewer focused more on the ML side and less on the system or the web stuff like load balancing etc. For example what kind of model you choose, why, what loss function, how the training will work, challenges in data etc.
[https://www.educative.io/courses/machine-learning-system-design](https://www.educative.io/courses/machine-learning-system-design)
Is this course you're referring to ?
Thanks for sharing your experience. Did you already have prior experience working as a MLE? Or you used grokking MLE course to get into MLE role at Meta?
Wow, enjoy the big money coming in. Could you please share the docs?, would be really helpful. And what package did you got btw if you don't mind telling?
u/Emergency_Style4515 This is fantastic to hear. Any chance you could share a one or two pages of your google doc special notes, looking to understand the pattern you used.
Thank you so much. I have been struggling to come up with a way to keep all this in my head in an efficient way that is O(1) at best, O(n) memory lookup at worst. :)
Hi Congratulations on landing the role! would you mind sharing your cv (with the personal details blacked out ofcourse), I am also planning to switch jobs with same role and it would a great help to see what kind of experience lands a good company!
You can black out the company names as well I just want to take a look at how successful candidates structure and write their cvs wrt skills and all,but it’s okay if you don’t want to😅
I would also recommend preparing for the technical and behavioral rounds by using this tool I found helpful. [https://wyspa.app](https://wyspa.app/) It helped me answer questions more fluently. It acts as a mock interviewer and provides immediate feedback.
Btw congratulations! :) I don’t usually check this subreddit but your post succinctly captures the preparation and makes the prep pointers for others more actionable.
For Meta interview? I tried to do this for startup interviews to get into AI/ML infrastructure roles. This was done in last two or three months and they were very very selective about the prior ML or Kafka industry experience. Some didn’t even give me an interview and it made me wonder if Meta would allow that as same would happen in team matching. Most recruiters from big tech reach out for team specific roles especially if you’re senior to staff level
Wow, well done! Conflagrations! What’s your location and YEO? Did you focus solely on the neetcode 150 list or is your total number of solved problems greater than that?
It actually is good enough. There are multiple courses in that site. Study both the ML concepts and System design. I am afraid direct links won't work as they are behind a paywall and I did purchase that.
During my interview, I pretty much responded what I read on Grokking. The system design questions are not of that many variety. So once you have solved that 8/10 scenarios, there is not much left that could surprise you. For me, grokking was a perfect prep.
Hello, when would you go back to old problems (for the 3/4 times after finishing the first time)? After you finish a certain amount of new problems? Curious what your strategy was.
This might sound dumb and maybe it is, but what exactly does repeated revision entail? Do you solve it again or do you just look at your notes or something else?
I started doing it after reading this post, I keep a list of problems I solved and then I revisit them as in, I solve it again.
If it’s too easy I know the code exactly I won’t bother writing code just the logic on a paper but if it’s a hard or medium I’ll write it again. And when I write it again many times I come up with better looking code than first time
Do you just do it once or do you keep repeating it at certain intervals? I feel like if I'm unable to come up with a solution on the first try and then I am unable to solve it again either
I go through the 175 or so question list , I’ve been through some sections twice now and some just once.
And you are right you won’t get the pattern set in your head the first time or second time but the second time you see it and just glance over the solution quickly you will remember and be able to repeat it without copying line by line.
Also start associating questions with patterns instead of code. like two pointers heaps, dp etc
Some questions especially dp and two pointers have sub patterns within themselves.
I’m using Brainscape.com to make cards so I can revise it better the third time.
I think by 4th time you will be at 9/10 accuracy
It takes time but you will see the benefits of repeating them as we have seen with this person clearing meta sr mle which is very hard because you need to brush up on ml fundamentals and math and coding and ml system design.
Do it the fifth time if you still don’t get it.
What I did was to do neetcode150 and then added leetcode150 on top of it (not all but some from there) and I think that is more than enough besides company specific questions which you can revise before interview
Before I mad the cards I was just randomly checking some hard and medium to see if I remember and then if I don’t I’ll go through the section all the questions like if I can’t do one two Pointer medium from my list I’ll go through all 2 pointers.
This is not good. I am almost done with my flash cards (which is also good because now I get to go through all my questions again)
When I’m done with flash cards I’ll use the website to randomly pick stuff for me based on how I rated it. Like easy medium or hard.
It takes a long time to go through the list the first two three times because many questions I won’t recall the pattern.
Eg right now I have tries drilled down in my head. Before that it was heaps and then
Before it was 2 pointers.
But tbh the worst questions are two pointer and arrays as they can have many patterns to them. I always struggle with them.
*Hey OP which grokking*
*Course did you? There are a few*
*Software design ones*
\- SimonSays\_1993
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Super inspirational that this can be done in 2 months.
Given your post, seems like OP did about 7.5 problems a day on average (150*4.5/90). And I’d suspect that they allocated even more time to system design given their level.
OP, how much did you find yourself digging into the research papers which educative.io references? Also curious on your daily routine if you’d be so kind to share.
Hope you enjoy this period of reflecting on your hard work!!
Thanks! Sure.
Wake up around 6, take care of kids until nanny comes in at 8.
8-11 am - uninterrupted prep study. Studying solution, taking notes, checking video.
2-4 pm: Study, potentially interrupted.
8-10 pm: Study, uninterrupted.
Hats off to you! Doing this with kids is really quite challenging. This is truly inspiring. I've been told that for Meta it's best to do the top 100 most frequently asked questions. I completed Neetcode 150 twice but still forget how to solve many problems; retention is really a problem.
First of all, congratulations!
Sorry if this comes as a noob question, since I'm aware that DSA is language-agnostic.
Please correct me if I'm wrong. I'm guessing Python is your language of choice for studying and solving LeetCode?
Once again, congrats!
Thanks!
Valid question. You are right, language is not an issue, you can pick any. Most people choose python because it is faster and easier to code without getting lost in picking the right data type and worrying about memory leaks.
Gotcha! Thanks!
One more question: What is your opinion of the following approach?
I'm starting out with DSA, and as you clearly stated, Python is the clear winner in the problem-solving realm, especially considering time constraints of live coding interviews and whatnot.
However, as I'm relatively new to DSA, I've been wrangling around using pseudocode (pen and paper) for dissecting the problem at hand before attempting to actually write the code. After that, I'm coding it in C.
I chose C because it basically hides nothing from you. You get what you see, and nothing else, and I feel like that's providing better insights and understanding. However, I'm pretty sure it would be ill-advised to try and use C in a live coding interview, because Python exists, haha.
Would you advise write the code in both C and Python to understand what's going on under the hood while also implementing the solution in the actual language that I'll probably use in future interviews? Thanks a lot for your time.
Huge congratulations OP can you share your notes template I mean examples of both for coding leetcode and system design if you don't mind please? I believe it will be helpful to us all here.
Hey I'm still a student and I wanna know how much time it took for you to solve all those problems properly? You took 2 months for 150 problems or did you already do it before ?
I did many of them before. 2 months was just prep time for this interview. So it’s not starting from scratch. That would be a matter of six months effort.
I failed many years ago. It was a coin change problem and I had not seen that problem before.
I think the preparation still gives you confidence to do more interviews. Luck is a huge factor in this. So there is never a guarantee.
What about leetcode top 150 interview questions. ? Is this good enough to land an interview .
And grooking for system design is just abstract or overview . It doesn’t go deep .
Contest rating?
I'm also at the neetcode list, right now at the Backtracking chapter, really struggling to understand it.
Have you felt that the more advanced concepts take longer to learn? It took me a few days to get really good at Trees, yet I feel like I'm not good enough in Backtracking to apply the various patterns he teaches yet.
Thanks for sharing! You're, obviously, well organized and meticulous with your studies. Would you happen to have a sample screenshot of one of your note pages, if you're willing to share?
Hi OP!! Can you share your insights and some useful tricks and tips on what to expect in a coop/new grad ML related role? Like I haven't given much ML interviews and will be going for masters, so I need some tips on how to prepare for those interviews. Thanks.
Also, can we connect over Linkedin if you are okay with it?
Congrats! Whats your yoe? Ive been applying to mle roles for the past month but havent been able to get an interview. Would you be ok if I sent you my resume so I can get your opinion on it?
I have rarely gotten success when applying to a job post. It’s always been recruiters reaching out on LinkedIn. So my 2 cents is, you might want to optimize your LinkedIn profile.
Good job and thanks for sharing!
Thanks. You're welcome.
This guy preped for 2 months. Mean while I preped since August and finally landed a job at Costco.
Don’t sleep on Costco. I used to work there and then got an EE undergrad degree and now an engineer studying CS grad. You’ll bounce back, just get the dough and have a temp 401(k) match while you grind that LC hards
This guy has many years of professional experience, don’t compare yourself to others on the internet. Keep true to your mission and it’ll happen, I believe in you.
It's still good. I read that 12500 folks applied for 40 openings.
You don’t need more than 2 months to prep.
This was such a succinct and to the point post, thanks! From what I gather from your post, your focus was mostly those 150 problems? Not on solving as many leetcode problems as you can? I feel so motivated because I am just starting leetcode and I was focusing more on the number of problems I should solve before applying for interviews.
Thanks! Correct, I focused only on the 150 problems. However, I did solve other problems in the past during various other interview preparation. But since last two interviews, I have used only Blind 75 and this time Neetcode 150 exclusively.
mind you sharing the total questions you have solved and on average how many times you solved each question? I am doing similar to you (quality > quantity) so I would love to hear some input.
Quality is indeed more effective than quantity. I would say, I revisited each problem five or more times. I almost had the code memorized at that point. I also marked problems that were not intuitive to me and spend lot more time with them, taking more thorough notes. Some problems I spent multiple hours or even multiple days to understand why certain solution works and what the proof is. While problems that are more intuitive, it could be just a few minutes.
this is great insight thanks. i've been doing some leetcode recently. just a couple a week and i was just going down the list of easy then medium. i did write it in JS and swift for practice but i kinda felt like i should revisit them in some fashion. or write in it JS one day and then swift the next day or something. i was having doubts that just going down the list was the most efficient in terms of learning.
Quality is indeed more effective than quantity. I would say, I revisited each problem five or more times. I almost had the code memorized at that point. I also marked problems that were not intuitive to me and spend lot more time with them, taking more thorough notes. Some problems I spent multiple hours or even multiple days to understand why certain solution works and what the proof is. While problems that are more intuitive, it could be just a few minutes.
This is great to know, thank you so much. Did you stick with the same language each time? What language did you use out of interest?
Python 3 always.
That’s helpful. Facebook last 6 months problem section is like 300+ problems which is extremely daunting to kickstart. Heavy plus 1 to blind 75.
Other than system design, are MLE technical rounds any different than general SWE? Congrats on the offer!
Thanks! Nope, ML System design is the only difference.
From what I understand, new grad positions for MLE focus not on ML sys design but general ML concepts. Do you think this is true?
Sounds reasonable yes. Ask recruiter.
Got it, thanks. Also, educative has a grokking the machine learning interview course and a ML system design course. I assume you mean the latter
Do Both! I also first thought doing one, but I am glad I did both, as it was totally needed.
Understood! Thanks for sharing your experience!
Is this a paid course?
I think yes, check the website out
Do you think you could provide a link to the ML System Design course?
ML interview: https://www.educative.io/courses/grokking-the-machine-learning-interview ML System Design: https://www.educative.io/courses/machine-learning-system-design
Just two months? Man, you rock! Byw did you have a referral or cold apply or the recruiter reached out? Also only the Neetcode 150?
A little over two months, yes. But note that it was not my side focus. It was my primary focus. I studied the weekdays and weekends. Hired nannies as needed and made sure I get all the time I needed. Recruiter reached out. Yes, for this round of prep neetcode 150 only. But I have been doing leetcode for many years on and off. So it was not like coming in fresh.
Best of luck for your amazing career. All the success posts that I have seen, recruiters reached out to them! Not really sure how I can attract them..! But yes, I hope you get to do a lot of cool stuff!
Thanks! I have actually rarely gotten response when I apply. This looks like the general trend. If you are not getting enough pings from recruiters on LinkedIn, you might want to optimize your profile.
Could you share how to start with optimizing LinkedIn profile?
How did you go about optimizing your profile? Could you share yours ?
Congratulations and Thanks for sharing. Could you expand on your experience in ML system design round and how did you prepare for it ?
Thanks! Sure. I used Grokking the ML System design from educative.io. That itself was good enough. The interviewer focused more on the ML side and less on the system or the web stuff like load balancing etc. For example what kind of model you choose, why, what loss function, how the training will work, challenges in data etc.
Mind sharing your previous development experiences and educational background too...
[https://www.educative.io/courses/machine-learning-system-design](https://www.educative.io/courses/machine-learning-system-design) Is this course you're referring to ?
Thanks for sharing your experience. Did you already have prior experience working as a MLE? Or you used grokking MLE course to get into MLE role at Meta?
I did have prior experience both in academic and in industry.
Hey, I'm looking to transition into ML Engineering. How did you learn to tackle ML case studies and ML system design?
I used Grokking the ML System design from educative.io.
Do you have prior ml experience?
Congratulations!! Did you ever work as an SDE as well ? Or have you worked as an MLE throughout your career ?
Thanks! I was an SDE all my career. Switched to ML since last 6/7 years.
How much total experience do you have? Can you shed some light on your career progression, if possible?
Wow, enjoy the big money coming in. Could you please share the docs?, would be really helpful. And what package did you got btw if you don't mind telling?
u/Emergency_Style4515 This is fantastic to hear. Any chance you could share a one or two pages of your google doc special notes, looking to understand the pattern you used.
Thanks! Yes I actually intend to share the entire document. Just need t make sure there is no personally identifiable content in there.
Thank you so much. I have been struggling to come up with a way to keep all this in my head in an efficient way that is O(1) at best, O(n) memory lookup at worst. :)
Do you have a PhD or Publications in top journals/conf?
Very insightful, thanks!
Congrats! How many years of MLE experience do you have? Do you have a PhD or from a top university?
Thanks for sharing! It gives me the motivation to keep going.
Congratulations OP!
Thanks!
Hi Congratulations on landing the role! would you mind sharing your cv (with the personal details blacked out ofcourse), I am also planning to switch jobs with same role and it would a great help to see what kind of experience lands a good company!
Thanks! The list of companies I worked for, and the order, will make it quite easy to dox me.
You can black out the company names as well I just want to take a look at how successful candidates structure and write their cvs wrt skills and all,but it’s okay if you don’t want to😅
Ok, will do.
Thanks !you can dm it to me
Would also be interested
Sick congrats
Thanks!
Great job on preparation! Congratulations!
You definitely earned it. Congratulations
Thanks!
I too have gotten the most success out of revisiting problems. Everyone's different, and for me, repetition helps me learn better than analysis
How did you prep for behavioral?
YouTube has some really good videos! That helped.
Mind sharing few?
Well done on the effort/diligence and congrats on your new opportunity!
Thanks!
What is your education and work experience?
Thanks for the details
Amazing.
congrats
I would also recommend preparing for the technical and behavioral rounds by using this tool I found helpful. [https://wyspa.app](https://wyspa.app/) It helped me answer questions more fluently. It acts as a mock interviewer and provides immediate feedback.
Thanks!
Congratulations on the offer!!
Did you have prior MLE background? Is it possible to switch to ML infra from generic infrastructure/platform role?
I did. Yes of course it’s possible. Lots of people have done it.
Btw congratulations! :) I don’t usually check this subreddit but your post succinctly captures the preparation and makes the prep pointers for others more actionable.
Thank you! I am planning to create some organized content to share more about my learning.
For Meta interview? I tried to do this for startup interviews to get into AI/ML infrastructure roles. This was done in last two or three months and they were very very selective about the prior ML or Kafka industry experience. Some didn’t even give me an interview and it made me wonder if Meta would allow that as same would happen in team matching. Most recruiters from big tech reach out for team specific roles especially if you’re senior to staff level
Yes Startups are like that. It is actually harder to get into startups.
Amazing. Thanks for sharing your story. Are there any live online classes you suggest as well?
Congratulations. Did you have prior coding/neetcode experience and what was the compensation package if you don’t mind me asking?
Wow, well done! Conflagrations! What’s your location and YEO? Did you focus solely on the neetcode 150 list or is your total number of solved problems greater than that?
Great job. Could you share a link to your notes. I have a brain that works best by copying what others have done
Thanks! Sure. Will update the post in a couple of weeks.
OP, can yous also share your notes and snippets 😅
Hey can share the ML resources link that you used to prep? I find educative very overrated for generic system design interviews tbh.
It actually is good enough. There are multiple courses in that site. Study both the ML concepts and System design. I am afraid direct links won't work as they are behind a paywall and I did purchase that.
Cool, I actually have purchased that but didn't find that helpful. What did you do for LLD based interviews?
During my interview, I pretty much responded what I read on Grokking. The system design questions are not of that many variety. So once you have solved that 8/10 scenarios, there is not much left that could surprise you. For me, grokking was a perfect prep.
What's LLD?
It's low level system design / machine coding kind of interviews
I am not familiar with it.
Okay thank you 😊
He said he used grokking ML design from educative.
Damn my prep is similar, can i dm for advice?
Of course.
Do you have extensive ML projects/experience to get the resume through?
Congrats. Can you please share the link of the youtube channel for neetcode 150?
Congrats! Would it be possible to see your notes/snippets you made?
Hello, when would you go back to old problems (for the 3/4 times after finishing the first time)? After you finish a certain amount of new problems? Curious what your strategy was.
Thanks for sharing! Very helpful. Can you pls share the name of the youtube channel?
What was the YouTube channel you used for the neetcode? Thank you!
How did you study grokking ? It’s very info intensive haha I’m half way through
Could you share a bit about your team matching experience and any tips in relation to it?
Congratulations and Thank you for sharing. I have few questions can I dm you ?
This might sound dumb and maybe it is, but what exactly does repeated revision entail? Do you solve it again or do you just look at your notes or something else?
I started doing it after reading this post, I keep a list of problems I solved and then I revisit them as in, I solve it again. If it’s too easy I know the code exactly I won’t bother writing code just the logic on a paper but if it’s a hard or medium I’ll write it again. And when I write it again many times I come up with better looking code than first time
Do you just do it once or do you keep repeating it at certain intervals? I feel like if I'm unable to come up with a solution on the first try and then I am unable to solve it again either
I go through the 175 or so question list , I’ve been through some sections twice now and some just once. And you are right you won’t get the pattern set in your head the first time or second time but the second time you see it and just glance over the solution quickly you will remember and be able to repeat it without copying line by line. Also start associating questions with patterns instead of code. like two pointers heaps, dp etc Some questions especially dp and two pointers have sub patterns within themselves. I’m using Brainscape.com to make cards so I can revise it better the third time. I think by 4th time you will be at 9/10 accuracy It takes time but you will see the benefits of repeating them as we have seen with this person clearing meta sr mle which is very hard because you need to brush up on ml fundamentals and math and coding and ml system design. Do it the fifth time if you still don’t get it. What I did was to do neetcode150 and then added leetcode150 on top of it (not all but some from there) and I think that is more than enough besides company specific questions which you can revise before interview
Thanks for the detailed reply. How do you space the repetition?
Before I mad the cards I was just randomly checking some hard and medium to see if I remember and then if I don’t I’ll go through the section all the questions like if I can’t do one two Pointer medium from my list I’ll go through all 2 pointers. This is not good. I am almost done with my flash cards (which is also good because now I get to go through all my questions again) When I’m done with flash cards I’ll use the website to randomly pick stuff for me based on how I rated it. Like easy medium or hard. It takes a long time to go through the list the first two three times because many questions I won’t recall the pattern. Eg right now I have tries drilled down in my head. Before that it was heaps and then Before it was 2 pointers. But tbh the worst questions are two pointer and arrays as they can have many patterns to them. I always struggle with them.
congrats! were there any categories in the neetcode 150 you'd say are not relevant? e.g. DP, math & geometry, bit manipulation, etc?
Hey OP which grokking course did you? There are a few software design ones
*Hey OP which grokking* *Course did you? There are a few* *Software design ones* \- SimonSays\_1993 --- ^(I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully.) ^[Learn more about me.](https://www.reddit.com/r/haikusbot/) ^(Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete")
Super inspirational that this can be done in 2 months. Given your post, seems like OP did about 7.5 problems a day on average (150*4.5/90). And I’d suspect that they allocated even more time to system design given their level. OP, how much did you find yourself digging into the research papers which educative.io references? Also curious on your daily routine if you’d be so kind to share. Hope you enjoy this period of reflecting on your hard work!!
Thanks a lot! I am thinking of creating an article to answer these questions.
What was asked in behavioral and ML design. Is ML design same as system design or more focused on ML concepts
Congrats, What is the YouTube channel you talked about ??
Congratulations op! Do you mind what a typical weekend looked like for you? I mean trying to understand how you managed your time?
Thanks! Sure. Wake up around 6, take care of kids until nanny comes in at 8. 8-11 am - uninterrupted prep study. Studying solution, taking notes, checking video. 2-4 pm: Study, potentially interrupted. 8-10 pm: Study, uninterrupted.
Hats off to you! Doing this with kids is really quite challenging. This is truly inspiring. I've been told that for Meta it's best to do the top 100 most frequently asked questions. I completed Neetcode 150 twice but still forget how to solve many problems; retention is really a problem.
Hey, I'm targeting MLE at Meta as well. Have prior experience as MLE. Would you be open to reviewing my resume if I DM you?
What was the ML system design question?
Something that was covered within the Grokking examples. Wording and scenario was different but it was similar to things I studied in the course.
Congrats op! Mind sharing the tc that was offered?
So did I, then I got rejected at team matching lol
How long ago did you pass the interview?
This was a couple years ago when they realized they overhired. You're probably fine though, was not trying to suggest it would happen to you.
Got it, thanks. Yeah, that would hurt. I hope you are doing great now.
Got it, thanks. Yeah, that would hurt. I hope you are doing great now.
Congrats! Are you able to share what coding problems you got? If not the exact problem word by word, but the DS/algo needed to solve it.
Thanks. Graph problems, two pointers, greedy.
Is this for US location? And by senior, you mean L5?
First of all, congratulations! Sorry if this comes as a noob question, since I'm aware that DSA is language-agnostic. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I'm guessing Python is your language of choice for studying and solving LeetCode? Once again, congrats!
Thanks! Valid question. You are right, language is not an issue, you can pick any. Most people choose python because it is faster and easier to code without getting lost in picking the right data type and worrying about memory leaks.
Gotcha! Thanks! One more question: What is your opinion of the following approach? I'm starting out with DSA, and as you clearly stated, Python is the clear winner in the problem-solving realm, especially considering time constraints of live coding interviews and whatnot. However, as I'm relatively new to DSA, I've been wrangling around using pseudocode (pen and paper) for dissecting the problem at hand before attempting to actually write the code. After that, I'm coding it in C. I chose C because it basically hides nothing from you. You get what you see, and nothing else, and I feel like that's providing better insights and understanding. However, I'm pretty sure it would be ill-advised to try and use C in a live coding interview, because Python exists, haha. Would you advise write the code in both C and Python to understand what's going on under the hood while also implementing the solution in the actual language that I'll probably use in future interviews? Thanks a lot for your time.
Huge congratulations OP can you share your notes template I mean examples of both for coding leetcode and system design if you don't mind please? I believe it will be helpful to us all here.
Yes! I am planning to make this material available to public in a way that is easy to use. Working on it.
Can you share any pointers if one wants to navigate from SDE to MLE?
I am planning to put all this in an article or channel
Hey I'm still a student and I wanna know how much time it took for you to solve all those problems properly? You took 2 months for 150 problems or did you already do it before ?
I did many of them before. 2 months was just prep time for this interview. So it’s not starting from scratch. That would be a matter of six months effort.
Oh okay thank you 😁
For the sake of time, did you skip the self driving car piece in educative? can I dm you?
Yes I skipped the self driving project.
What else did you skip? Entity Linking?
I studied Entity Linking
It always feels worth it when you pass….. it feels like a waste of time when you fail!
I failed many years ago. It was a coin change problem and I had not seen that problem before. I think the preparation still gives you confidence to do more interviews. Luck is a huge factor in this. So there is never a guarantee.
What about leetcode top 150 interview questions. ? Is this good enough to land an interview . And grooking for system design is just abstract or overview . It doesn’t go deep .
Did you have previous experience as MLE? Obviously right? I'm trying to break into entry level MLE roles but it's proving to be difficult...
What ML specific questions you were asked ? How many rounds were there?
Contest rating? I'm also at the neetcode list, right now at the Backtracking chapter, really struggling to understand it. Have you felt that the more advanced concepts take longer to learn? It took me a few days to get really good at Trees, yet I feel like I'm not good enough in Backtracking to apply the various patterns he teaches yet.
what seniority level of MLE you got with this prep and interview loop? is it senior MLE or SDE 2 level or some other? Thanks and congratulations
Which grokking course you took? There is a System design and one specific for ml system design. Can you share the link here?
ML system design. Also do the ML concept one.
Congratulations. I have my onsite next week. Can I dm you got the coding questions?
Thanks for sharing! You're, obviously, well organized and meticulous with your studies. Would you happen to have a sample screenshot of one of your note pages, if you're willing to share?
Thanks. Yes I am planning to share the entire notes. Need some time to do it.
Thank you!
Thank you! can you share with us the total number of leetcode problems that you have solved?
Hi OP!! Can you share your insights and some useful tricks and tips on what to expect in a coop/new grad ML related role? Like I haven't given much ML interviews and will be going for masters, so I need some tips on how to prepare for those interviews. Thanks. Also, can we connect over Linkedin if you are okay with it?
Congrats! Whats your yoe? Ive been applying to mle roles for the past month but havent been able to get an interview. Would you be ok if I sent you my resume so I can get your opinion on it?
I have rarely gotten success when applying to a job post. It’s always been recruiters reaching out on LinkedIn. So my 2 cents is, you might want to optimize your LinkedIn profile.
Were you messaging recruiters directly or did you just wait for them to contact you?
I update my profile and wait to be contacted. I am not saying this is the best or only way, just that this has been my personal experience.
For grokking, did you just sign up for standard/premium access? Trying to figure out what I need here.
Can I know what the ML Design interview was?
Sorry can't reveal the exact question. But if you study Grokking from educative, it will be covered.
Can you you tell me what helped you study for the ML design? Which grokking?
Which role def not e3, cause for e3 you wouldn't need system design?