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 standard interview questions, applicants in the tech industry are also asked technical questions.

For many, these technical interviews are the most stressful part of the job-hunting process. 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 course 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 should also become comfortable talking about them, so you may accurately demonstrate and communicate your skills to potential employers.

Technical Interview Questions

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Hold a practice interview with your partner using the following questions. After the first partner has been interviewed, switch roles and interview the second partner.

• In TDD, why is it important to begin by testing the simplest possible behavior?
• Discuss the benefits of testing with your partner. Why should we write tests for our code? What can happen if we do not?
• What are the differences between local, instance, class and global variables? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each?
• What is CRUD?
• What is a dynamic route? How can we use them to add CRUD functionality to an application?
• How can modules and namespacing help us better encapsulate our code?
• What is a class method? When should we define a class method instead of an instance method?
• What is the difference between a GET and POST request? Provide an example use case of each.
• Consider the following code snippet. Walk your partner through what is occurring here, line-by-line. What can you tell about the application as a whole, based on this limited snippet?

...
post('/kittens') do
  name = params.fetch('name')
  age = params.fetch('age')
  color = params.fetch('color')
  @kitten = Kitten.new(name, age, color)
  @kitten.save()
  erb(:success)
end
...

Stories and Examples

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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.