I had the exact same questions (apparently for SRE-SWE prescreen), but a slightly more intelligent recruiter (who had actually chased me for 2 years before I agreed to interview, so they were a bit more invested than the OP's guy). I went on to a phone screen and then on-site interviews, and then the hiring committee. The HC decided that coding/algo was strong, but that they needed a stronger "signal" re system design, and to my surprise, scheduled me two more sys design interviews (I did a total of 7 on-sites). I prepared by reading all the Google, Facebook, and Amazon systems papers and did 6 mock interviews with Gainlo, where interviewers all gave pretty good feedback (which led me to believe I wasn't a total idiot). When I went to my final Google interviews, I thought I did pretty well except for a couple of TCP/IP questions related to checksums and congestion control. I found those odd because all the prep materials that recruiters sent me listed knowledge of TCP specifics as optional, and this isn't my area of expertise anyway.
Oddly, one of the interviewers also seemed surprised that I wasn't a TCP/IP guru (--I bet that now he's telling his buddies stories about a candidate who couldn't do the SRE equivalent of Fizzbuzz or something similar.)
A week later I get the rejection and a long survey containing a link to the job for which they applied on my behalf. It was an SRE position that required deep knowledge of TCP/IP and various other network protocols.
My actual areas of expertise (for the last 10 years) are 3D graphics and computational geometry.
Lesson learned: always check the description of the job that overly eager recruiters apply for on your behalf. Had I known, I would've studied all about TCP/IP and prepared for that level of detail. All that time I thought that I was applying for a general SWE track, and I simply expressed interest to be matched to teams specializing in infrastructure and distributed systems later.
Nothing in particular. I was just looking for a bit of a change and to gain more rounded experience. Being pigeonholed into one specific area (3D/CAD/CAM C++ development) for many years isn't that great for future career prospects, especially in a market where most mainstream job titles seem to be split into a front-end or a back-end development category, and my experience doesn't seem to put me in either...
I had the exact same questions (apparently for SRE-SWE prescreen), but a slightly more intelligent recruiter (who had actually chased me for 2 years before I agreed to interview, so they were a bit more invested than the OP's guy). I went on to a phone screen and then on-site interviews, and then the hiring committee. The HC decided that coding/algo was strong, but that they needed a stronger "signal" re system design, and to my surprise, scheduled me two more sys design interviews (I did a total of 7 on-sites). I prepared by reading all the Google, Facebook, and Amazon systems papers and did 6 mock interviews with Gainlo, where interviewers all gave pretty good feedback (which led me to believe I wasn't a total idiot). When I went to my final Google interviews, I thought I did pretty well except for a couple of TCP/IP questions related to checksums and congestion control. I found those odd because all the prep materials that recruiters sent me listed knowledge of TCP specifics as optional, and this isn't my area of expertise anyway.
Oddly, one of the interviewers also seemed surprised that I wasn't a TCP/IP guru (--I bet that now he's telling his buddies stories about a candidate who couldn't do the SRE equivalent of Fizzbuzz or something similar.)
A week later I get the rejection and a long survey containing a link to the job for which they applied on my behalf. It was an SRE position that required deep knowledge of TCP/IP and various other network protocols.
My actual areas of expertise (for the last 10 years) are 3D graphics and computational geometry.
Lesson learned: always check the description of the job that overly eager recruiters apply for on your behalf. Had I known, I would've studied all about TCP/IP and prepared for that level of detail. All that time I thought that I was applying for a general SWE track, and I simply expressed interest to be matched to teams specializing in infrastructure and distributed systems later.