Famous Quotes

There are no "knowns." There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say there are things that we now know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don't know.

-Donald Rumsfeld

Saturday, August 6, 2011

My journey to Amazon intern....part 3:P

                         Continuing from...."I was bitterly hungry so went out with a friend to have something and then came the call on my phone...."   Yes it was one of our guys who was waiting there outside for the results just like me... The only difference is right now am not there at the spot... So i went back along with my friend after gulping what i meant to enjoy drinking...Anyways chuck that... We reached over there... and the guy who called me said i made it to the next round along with few other people.. You know the exact number was not known to anyone 'cause afterwards they called few more.....


                      So, though i didn't have any expectations as a fellow candidate i was a bit apprehensive about what is next... So i asked others about what is gonna be next...Of course each had their own versions just like me... Then i managed to make out something from the morning experiences and my friends' ... that they were specific about something called 'approach'... so i was bit comfortable that i might be able to satisfy them with what i call that 'i just work on my intuition at the moment'... So i was waiting for my turn to come while discussing all petty things with others which was possible at that moment....


                     I didn't feel like sitting there anymore so i just gave company to the other one who was just having a walk around near-by asking about how he developed all such good programming skills specifically coding skills..i shared my stuff too... and then asked about some random stuff and time just passed for some time. I no longer felt like walking around as one of our guys was called in and he just left.. As i said earlier i was waiting for my turn.. Then one of the panelists came out and said that the others were busy with other candidates so we   could have  a short break or something, have our lunch and then could come back after one hour... we actually didnt have a mind-set to eat at all... After all we just need to know whether we would make it... But still as a bunch anything is possible....


                    Me and other few guys left to sc to have something and then there we met few of our friends who gave their wishes... I dont think that whether it really reached our minds or not as we were busy thinking something else... So we came back before 15 minutes of the stipulated time(let me say so... )... After sometime they called few of our friends and seniors and then was MY TURN....I WENT IN... to be continued in the next post.... Sorry for the extension of time.... Bye....

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

My journey to Amazon intern....part 2:P

       Continuing from... Damn man i never received any messages till then.. Then i texted our supposed to be cic-rep about the results.. and yes the results were out... To my relief in the message that followed contained the shortlisted candidates... and i was able to see my name present in full... Sugavanesh B... Then i asked about the timings for the next rounds and procedure...and yeah i was also supposed to forward this message to the other shortlisted friends of mine... well yeah i managed to do that... then i go myself ready with a slight relaxed manner with the idea that things never start in the mentioned time atleast here in our place... 

       But no, there came a message from one of my friends asking me to come fast.. OMG, i need to rush to the spot now... By the time i reached there others already have started taking the test... On the board were the questions something related to trees yet another time... and some stuff related to subsequence....

      I managed to understand the question by the time few were already ready to show their approaches or solutions... God knows what it really was.... But yeah i managed to crack the second problem first and then explained to the panelist and he felt it was right..(But you know what i was a little unsure whether it will work for few exceptions but yeah it actually works and he found that prior to me...) Then i was asked to think on the approach for the first one...which i had no idea(as of that moment)...

     Then came the memories of the past where i failed 'cause i thought monotonously without even thinking about other possibilities due to which i failed... So i was firm not to commit the same mistake again.. So i was thinking of all the possible computer algorithmic terms in my mind to relate to it rather than thinking about the basic thought behind it... DP, Hashing, STL, vectors, class, branching, greedy, local, and anything i have heard of or that was in my memory...... Nothing really worked except cracking few solutions here and there... Damn then came the sad part... The solution was the basic idea behind it... i guess u guessed it right...  monotonous thinking was the actual solution with best available space complexity(at least) and yeah i explained him the context he wanted to reduce the time complexity also but i had a thought about it and found it impossible.. This time i was more fixed with my idea and point that he also felt i was right.. and thats it i was asked to write the code....after struggling a lot i was actually able to 'programize' my idea... because of all those conditions and exceptions......

        I was a little confident of having solved both the problems and so i felt i have a kind of chance to make it to next level 'cause many felt their complexity wasn't that good... this complexity stuff always makes things complex.... 

        I was bitterly hungry so went out with a friend to have something and then came the call on my phone.... Continuing on part 3... You know i cant actually write the entire stuff altogether......

My journey to Amazon intern....part 1:P

      Well, yeah!! Now that i have got an intern offer from Amazon.. I can really feel the peace of mind which helped me to recover myself from the huge burden of the guilt of doing nothing during summer... That doesn't mean I am gonna stay doing nothing for the rest of the days till summer... It has really given me a strong boost to work on my future and projects...

      Having said all my bla bla bla... Let me share my interview experience... Actually I have no bad opinion to share about the entire process not just because I was taken in.. But its because i genuinely felt so.... The way they dealt with the candidates and the stuff they actually expected from us rather than the ultimate solution... I really liked that...

      After the lonely and lazy holidays... I never had the confidence of attending any intern interview the very first week after joining college..May be i need to put it this way that i was actually not ready for another humiliation and feeling of guilt... But yeah...as days passed by, i was able to pick myself..COURTESY:my past, seniors, friends and well-wishers... It all started with fb online written test.. To my surprise i was able to complete the problem (never mind all that complexity business...:P) but yeah that itself was a mark of improvement in my problem solving skills.. Then as expected.. to be genuine.. as deserved... i didn't clear the next rounds.. THe most deserving candidates made it... and i was sure about it... 

       Then came the Microsoft written test.. Was able to solve those problems... But to my dismay..i found myself not in a strong position even with the basics of C and C++..the demigod of CSE students of India(at least)....So that made me embarrassed really.. Yeah, I overcame the feeling in the matter of few days...


        Then came the amazon.. I really didn't have that kind of a bright picture of amazon like i had with facebook, microsoft or google for instance... But i found IMDB is owned by amazon COURTESY:the wonderful presentation they gave the other day's morning... I would have missed a lot if i had missed that presentation... And that excited me to a lot of extent obviously being a movie freak and a regular visitor of that website.... So i had a new energy(undefined).. and more passion to make it... and of course the thirst to get an intern at any cost... 

       To my good luck.. the questions were really of my type.. you know testing  apti , data structures and algo rather than just raw algo and stuff... which i should work on.. I managed to attend everything..inspite of negative marks for wrong answers in MCQ's ( that being my general tendency...).. And i found many of my answers happened to be right... Results were not released that night which i was eagerly awaiting.. Next morning i woke up due to a call from my friend..you know it took me some time to actually buckle up from my sleep...and there you go he said that the results were out and asked if i knew about it or recieived any intimation about it... Damn man i never received any message till then... Let me continue the rest of this long boring story in the next post....  Bye....

A small passage i admired..

"A wise man once sat in the audience and cracked a joke..all of them laughed like crazy
After a moment he cracked the same joke again & a little less people laughed this time...

He cracked the same one again and no one laughed,

Then he smiled and said "when you cant laugh on the same joke again and again then why do you keep crying over the same thing over and over again".

Forget the past and MOVE ON.!!!"