Leetcode : The saviour for Coding Interviews
So do you wanna be a Software Engineer at ABC company ?
Go to Leetcode.com . Pick a question, read the problem , write some code , run your code ,write some more code , run your code again ,get stuck .
Check some hints , still stuck .
Ok wait, I think it’s enough for an fun Intro of Leetcode.
Let’s start with some real story.
It was about March 2020 ,the lockdown happened which gave me ample amount of time to figure out my mistakes and at that time I also started preparing for the Internship as after a few months many companies were going to visit our campus for Intern recruitment. As I was familiar with Coding , I started solving problems , gave many short contests but was not able to see any progress(Yes the Ranking Graph was not going upwards 😣) . That time I called my friend Nitin, I still remember expressing my frustration to him of getting Low rank in the short contest over a Phone . I remember his words exactly :
Man relax, There is a platform which the crux of the interview game!
That’s when I first heard about LeetCode- a programming platform which has now become so popular that everyone who is going to give coding interviews in upcoming months may have gotten his hands dirty on leetcode. It is the platform where folks — mostly software engineers — practice their coding skills with an integrated ,online IDE which lets you verify your solution, it can be based on data structure , algorithms ,OOD ,database and many more . There are almost 1900+ questions , each with multiple solutions covering different edge cases (you will get average of about 50+ test cases in each question) . Most important , it also contains the stack overflow style discussion forum which lets you post and upvote/downvote solutions to the problems.
Talking about myself, I am using Leetcode since …
Why do I admire the Leetcode most over any other coding platforms ?
Talking about myself, I am more aligned towards Development (to know what I do daily in dev side , do follow me on Github : Scortier😄) who practice DSA daily to get familiar with relevant algorithms . I have explored many other coding platforms like CodeForces , CodeChef , Interview Bit, HackerEarth, HackerRank , Spoj, AtCoder and have done approximately 1000+ problems over these platforms but at last landed on Leetcode because it is the complete package that fulfilled my checklist :
1. Approach to get familiar with the almost all the interview question which get asked frequently.
2. To practice a new question daily.
3. Learn different approaches by looking over others code, analyzing time complexity.
4. Give short contest to check my progress (due to early time zone I usually skip Contest and do virtual contest 😐).
5. To get frequent update over recent asked questions in various companies
6. What compensation companies are offering to the engineers of different role.
Engineers believe that these resources help prepare them for what they will encounter in today’s technical aptitude screenings.
Today, if you are interview prepping, you’re going to have to spend some late evenings practicing interview problems on LeetCode. In the words of one of my good friends and colleague:
LeetCode is the great equalizer. Whether you are interviewing for an internship, as a fresher just out of college, or as a Head of Engineering , you’d better be LeetCoder.
Let’s take a look over the features and why the Leetcode is so popular in a Tech Industry to crack any coding interview irrespective of the position , as everywhere even in the Fully Development based companies too ask DSA and all other topics and it is important to know as the company expect that what you have learnt till now in college , can you perform well in the same or not.
Some of the important features :
1. Monthly Challenge and Online Coding Interview Platform (Online Interview , Assessment)
In these section , you can take mock interviews with your friends to get prepared for the real one 😜 and a way to be consistent is to be a part of monthly coding challenge as it reminds you through notifications to attempt the daily question on Monthly Challenge. (The main reason I do it to continue my streak , it look cool 😄 )
2. Weekly and Biweekly Contest and Explore Section ( Interview Specific , Learn particular DSA, Monthly Challenge Collection )
Give Live Contest boht weekly and biweekly ( I somehow missed many due to habit of late morning 😐 ), but I give virtual Contest as much as I can , practice particular data structure in explore section too.
3. Discuss Section ( interview question , interview experience, compensation , career, study guide, general discussion , feedback )
4. Top Hits Sidebar
It includes Leetcode curated algorithm , SQl 70, 100 liked questions, top interview questions, top company specific questions and many more.
5. Problems Section
Discussion Forum of each problem (MOST IMP FEATURE)
It is a stack-overflow style discussion forum which lets you post your solution , can look over the different approaches of the other coders and can also upvote/downvote solutions to the problems.
There is a Premium Subscription option available , surely there are benefits of taking subscriptions but I will highly recommend you to not purchase unless you have to prepare for any specific company in limited time regarding locked questions (Google it ! you will get it easily ).
So , if you are one who is not able to find the platform which makes your interview preparation easier then I highly recommend using Leetcode or I should say Grind Leetcode . I finally got landed in one of the impactful company in the world i.e. GO-JEK as a Product Engineer Intern ,which I really wanted and it was not possible if I haven’t get to know about the Leetcode .
So what are you waiting for … Go Leetcode and Chill !
