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[Lathentar]

So, I've gotten the great opportunity to fly up to Redmond and interview with Microsoft for an Internship this summer. Knowing there are a lot of CS majors on this board, I'm wondering if anyone has done this before and how well it went.

Also, since I'll be in Seattle for about 2 days what should I see and where show I go, eat, etc...

Thanks!

 

[fennec fox]

Remember, if they ask you questions about bowling balls, don't do what I did 5 years ago and just sort of hem and haw your way through the problem!

(I didn't do much coding of my own during college; part of the reason why I gave up on a coding-related career and went into the exciting world of video-game writing instead)

 

[beerbelly]

I dunno how strict they are in their interviews for an internship position, but my networking prof who worked at Microsoft says you need to have 99% of their questions correct.

 

[xsarien]

They're going to ask you a lot of brain-teaser like questions. My only advice to you is to pick up a book so you can practice working through them.

 

[Lathentar]

They're going to ask you a lot of brain-teaser like questions. My only advice to you is to pick up a book so you can practice working through them.

I was thinking about picking up the How to move Mt. Fuji book and reading through that.

 

[Pochacco]

It's not so much whether you answer those brain-teasers correctly, but more so how you go about solving them.

 

[jenov4]

I've heard MS interviews aren't as tough as Google's. Good luck though!

 

[Justin Bailey]

Here are some riddles they have asked in the past:

http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~wwu/riddles/microsoft.shtml

It's also just a cool riddle site to mess around on.

 

[Celicar]

My friend had a Microsoft interview. He didn't get the job though.

He told me a couple of the questions they asked him, and I thought the questions were kind of odd, but I always wanted to go to an interview and get questions like those.

One question he said they asked him was if your friend was running around a track in the middle of the night and you couldn't see him, how would you find him?

He said he would call out to him. Then after every answer he said the interviewer would put a restriction on the scenario. For example, the interviewer would say your friend is deaf. Then my friend would say he would run around the track clockwise and eventually run by him. The interviewer would say you're pinned down and can't move. And it would go on like that.

I forget what the other questions they asked him were, but my friend said he had no idea they would be asking questions like that. The best thing to do is go in prepared. My friend has read How Would You Move Mount Fuji? now and he knows why he didn't get the position.

 

[Justin Bailey]

Yeah that sounds similar to this question from the web site:

You are in a building, and you want to know what the temperature is outside. How do you do it?

Note 1: The way this riddle works is, after you mention a possible solution, the interviewer says that solution is not possible and asks what else you can do. So the scenario gets increasingly difficult, and it comes down to coming up with as many solutions as you can.

Example Dialogue:

You: "Well you could use X to find the temperature"
Them: "OK let's say there are no X's lying around"
You: "OK, perhaps you could try Y"
Them: "Y is broken, what else"

Note 2: I was actually asked this question by Microsoft! The interviewer was Andrew Gottelieb.

Basically, they want to see how many solutions you can come up with until you're stumped.

 

[Tenguman]

Those brain-teaser questions are funny. They aren't necessarily looking to see if you get the right answer, heck they may not have a right answer. What they are looking for is what your thinking process is like. Can you come up with interesting possible solutions? How do you go about getting that solution?

Best thing to do is to think out loud.

 

[xsarien]

Yeah that sounds similar to this question from the web site:



Basically, they want to see how many solutions you can come up with until you're stumped.

You: "Well you could use X to find the temperature"
Them: "OK let's say there are no X's lying around"
You: "OK, perhaps you could try Y"
Them: "Y is broken, what else"

Take pieces from X, pieces from Y, invent Z and take the damned temperature. It's also impervious to snotty interviewers changing the rules like a 13-year-old DM.

 

[Fresh Prince]

Okay I have an interview coming up as well so I might as well tack on my queries on this thread (no offense to Lanthar):

Basically I've got an interview with as a 'Interaction Designer' and/or as a Programmer.
I going to do these:
1) Study my languages and Software Engineering
2) Learn about the company
3) Preparing myself for common questions etc.

Is there anything else I should do?

Also what is 'fashionable' to wear for an interview- I've seen a lot of people around uni wearing suits that don't look entirely comfortable. I'm thinking if I look the part it might not make me a nervous reck at the interview

 

[Brannon]

I'd use an outdoor thermometer
---it's broken, what now?

I'd go to the lounge and change it to the local news or weather channel
---TV's being used for por- I mean presentations, what now?

I'd call the infoline for time, weather and temperature (actually had this in Mississippi of all places)
---phone's down, what now?

I'd log on to weather.com and check local condition
---we're Microsoft and you expect our stuff to WORK? GET OUT I mean we're busy upgrading our servers, what now?

I'd turn off all climate control on an unimportant floor and look at the thermostat after a while
---touch that thermostat and I'll cut you, what now?

I'd listen for crickets outside and use the cricket method to extract the temperature
---they've all been eaten by birds, what now?

Damn I'm stumped, anybody want to continue?

 

[rastex]

I've heard MS interviews aren't as tough as Google's. Good luck though!

This is true.

A bunch of my friends are going to MS this winter for internships and none of them said the interview was particularly tough. Google on the otherhand... ya, my one friend got totally rocked on that one.

 

[Axsider]

Microsoft = Evil
Remember that