Janani - Zoho Interview Experience

 Name:  Janani Kripa M

Department:  BTECH Bioinformatics

College: SASTRA UNIVERSITY

Company Name: Zoho Corporation

Designation: Member Technical Staff

● Round details

○ No. of rounds :  5

○ Topics to concentrate on : Loops, pattern generation and basic operations on data structures (particularly linked lists) were a few topics that I found important.

● Questions asked in each Round :

1.) The first round comprised of technical and quantitative aptitude. There were 15 questions under each. The quantitative section tested logical and sensible thinking. There were no chapter-wise questions as such. A bit of common sense should do. Have in mind, inky ponky won't work. The technical section required outputs for the given codes. It majorly had confusing iterations, string handling, function calls and pointers. Some basic knowledge on these should work.
Note : Remember to keep your cool.

2.) Since I was a non-IT student, I was given a chance to take up the interviews directly. But, when you know you're technically sound and you're confident about your preparation, choose the long route. It works, trust me.
5 programs were asked. 
a) Find out the biggest possible palindrome from the given set of words. In case of multiple palindromes, printing one of them will suffice.
Input : This is a sample text for testing
Output : Max possible palindrome - 15 characters
ttissaepeassitt
b) In linked-list A of length N, find the data present in the Kth node from the last i.e.(N-K)th position.
Input : N=6,   A=1 4 2 5 6 10,  K=3
Output : 5
c) Given an array, find the maximum sum found in any contiguous sub array of X containing only positive numbers. Print the sum and the array elements of the sub array.
Input : [-8,12,15,1,-10]
Output : Max sum=28; Array elements={12,15,1}
d) Given a linked list of 0's,1's and 2's, sort in such a way that it contains 0's first, 1s next and 2s at the end using a single loop.
Input : N=8 A=10102020
Output : 00001122
e) Given an array of integers, sort the array according to decreasing order of frequency of elements.
Input : {6,4,7,13,4,6,4,4,13,4,6}
Output : {4,4,4,4,4,6,6,6,13,13,7}

Note : Your algorithm, the language you use don't matter. Come up with the output and explain your approach. 
Those with 3 and more correct programs got into the next round.


3.) This was basically to pick out those that deserved 6.6 LPA. The 
round involved testing object-oriented concepts. Use of collections and hash-maps helps.
We were asked to design a taxi booking service with numerous constraints viz.about which taxi to be booked according to the location of the customer and the taxi at that point of time. The best designs get the 6.6 package. There were comparatively fewer eliminations in this round.
Note : In both the 2nd and the 3rd round, you will be given enough time. So, don't be in a hurry. 

4.) It was a technical interview, not very screwing. Fundamental concepts were tested and questions on your areas of interest will be raised. A couple of aptitude questions was asked. Some questions on DBMS were asked. You'll be made to feel comfortable, you need not feel anxious. 
Note : Feel free to say you don't know when you don't know. It doesn't really matter.

5.) HR interview was just a formal one. Basic, predictable HR questions were asked. About the achievements you'd have listed down in your resume and all that.

●  What did they ask from Resume?

       Choose your areas of interest carefully. There's a huge probability that you'll be tested on that. Otherwise, only HR questions demanded resume.

● From where to prepare?

         Google for Zoho interview experiences. When you keep hunting, you'll realize a pattern. Once you know what the questions are like, preparation will be a cake walk. www.geeksforgeeks.org was a great source for me to learn.

● I think I was selected because? I hail from Bioinformatics and I was not very well-versed in complicated concepts. Honestly I was scared to compete with CSE guys. But I was sure of my basics and wanted to experience the process. I just brushed up the funda's and learnt some basics of datastructures (just the the traversal and the basic operations) before the process and that helped me so much. I was not very anxious myself and people there helped me maintain my cool. Just stay relaxed, things will fall in place when they're meant to.

● My advice to aspirants: 

We were let to code in DEV C++. Prior practice in the environment helps. It's okay to do one program in Java and the others in C++. It's up to you. Just get to know the pattern of questions being asked every year before you start preparing.You get through or not, something great is waiting to be yours. Just cherish the experience. 

Good luck!