I am going to interview next week for programming job. I am new to
java, but I am reading a lot. The advisor at college said she knows C++
people are getting the question write this with no library call:
int atoi(const char* num); // takes string and returns integer value
void itoa(const int i, char *num); // takes a number and return ascii
representation
She says this are typical questions for C++. Can you share typical
questions for java?
A Google search for "java interview questions" will find several
(thousands even). You could also search for example questions for the Sun
Certified Java Programmer exam, as these might be the kind of things you
would be asked.
Beyond giving you practice, preparing for particular questions will only
be helpful if you get lucky and meet the same questions.
It depends on what you claim to know and what the position requires. For
entry-level, at the very least, as well as knowing all the main language
features (classes, interfaces, exceptions, synchronisation, etc.), you
would be expected to know about and be able to use most of the classes in
the java.lang, java.util and java.io packages. Pay particular attention
to the collections classes. You should know which ones to use in which
circumstances (e.g. what are the advantages of a LinkedList over an
ArrayList). Make sure you know, and can explain clearly, what the
hashCode method is for, how it relates to the equals method and how it is
used by collections classes (this is a typical question to separate the
wheat from the chaf).
You are unlikely only to be asked coding questions. You may be asked
about general OO concepts such as polymorphism, or asked about design
issues. You could prepare for this by considering the design of some of
these core classes. Have a look at the way interfaces (particularly List,
Set and Map) and abstract classes are used in the collections heirarchy
and think about why these decisions were made. If you don't know already,
find out what the Decorator pattern is and then try to identify how it is
used in the java.io package.
Good luck,
Dan.
