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✏️ Technical Interview Practice

Chances are, you're likely attending Epicodus because you're planning to begin a new career in the tech industry. We're so glad to help you on your journey! After your time with us, you'll begin applying and interviewing for positions. Usually, in addition to the more "standard" interview questions about your work experience, career goals, and education, applications in the tech industry are also asked to answer technical questions.

For many, these technical interviews are the most stressful part of the job-hunting process. Coding can be challenging enough, but being prompted to explain and demonstrate complex concepts in front of potential employers is tough. The key is to begin practicing ahead of time, to ensure you're ready for the real thing before you even schedule the interview!

At the end of every course section, we'll take a small break from coding to practice technical interview questions with our partner. These questions will (primarily) revolve around the content we learned in this section, and, much like a "real" interview, some will be more technical than others. In addition to learning how to implement the new tools, technologies, and concepts, you want to become comfortable talking about them too, so you may accurately demonstrate and communicate these skills you've learned to potential employers in an interview.

Technical Interview Questions​

  • What is Entity? How does it make our lives easier as developers?
  • What are navigation properties?
  • What is an HTML helper method? List a few examples.
  • What is the difference between SqlCommand and SqlDataReader?
  • What is the difference between a primary key and a foreign key?
  • What has to be done to establish a one-to-many relationship in a database?
  • Why do we use a test database?
  • What does CRUD stand for?
  • What is the difference between a PATCH and POST request?
  • What is the purpose of RESTful routing? What benefit does it offer?
  • Discuss the difference between POST and GET. When do we use a POST route, when a GET?
  • Walk through each of the following types of HTTP requests, describe what they do, and when you would use each:
    • PATCH
    • POST
    • GET
    • DELETE
  • What is ViewBag? How does it work?
  • Why is it important that the ID ID value of objects in our application match the ID of that information's entry in our database?
  • Why do we override the equals operator when we are testing a database?
  • What is a navigation property and what purpose do it serve in EF Core?
  • What is MySQL Workbench? What functionality does it offer?
  • Talk about a project you created recently that you're proud of. What skills does it demonstrate? What challenges did you face during the course of development?
  • What are you looking forward to learning most?
  • Describe a challenge you faced in a group or partner project, and explain what you did to resolve this issue.

Stories and Examples​

Offering a tangible story or example that highlights your skills usually goes much further in an interview than simply telling your interviewer you're good at something. (i.e.: Telling a story about a time you tracked down a tricky bug versus simply saying "I'm good at problem-solving!").

Review the STAR method, discussed in this lesson on non-technical interviews. Use the STAR method to practice answering non-technical questions with your partner.

Again, if you come up with a story or example you feel good about, jot it down somewhere! It's tough to come up with stories like this in an interview on the spot. Having a few tucked away to review before an interview will be a huge benefit to you later.