How to ace an J2EE Interview!! - PART 1

Hello Members & Visitors of Exforsys.com:

I just wanted to give a piece of advise to all those who are starting off as budding J2EE professionals. I am not an expert, nor do I have 10 years or 15 years of experience to advise you. But these suggestions are often overlooked and might give you an edge when you are interviewing for a J2EE position.

1. Ask the vendor who will be interviewing you and especially, the name of the person!

-> A desi name indicates, you are in for a rough ride! Expect questions to be highly technical. Although the questions provided here on exforsys.com cover about 50% of the technical questions, it is incomplete. If we could come up with an initiative like an automated Question Bank where members could submit questions and other senior members could answer them, it would be wonderful.

-> Most of these desi interviewers comprise of two categories -> Project Leads or Java Architects. If he/she is a project lead, make sure you know in and out about Java fundamentals, API\'s and EJB\'s. If he/she is a Java Architect, make sure you know all of the above as well as how to apply them for situations.

-> Also, before the start of the interview, chit-chat a little bit about the roles and responsibilities of the persons who are interviewing you. A front-end developer will query you more on JSPs, Servlets, Struts, XML(Different parsers .. Don\'t just stick with DOM/SAX).. A server-side developer will stick to Bean Development, Transaction Management, Struts, JUnit etc. and will not go in depth with front-end development... An administrator will just stick to server administration and deployment of j2Ee.

-> For gora\'s, it is a lot better. They realize that they are not looking for heads-down coders but also some one who can do problem-solving and analysis. In that way, you can relax a bit.

NOTE: The bottom line is, when you are preparing, make sure you prepare for the worst-case scenario - A desi guy interviewing you! Believe me, you will be glad you did because the minute you talk to a gora interviewer, you can blast the brains out of him with your answers.. :P

If you have a couple of years of experience, find this book -> Codenotes: J2EE programming at Barnes and Nobles (or any other book shop). This is a very valuable book and summarizes the J2EE domain and technologies used.. I highly recommend it..

Apart from that, keep reading Chapter 1 of books which focus on J2EE technologies. A gora interviewer loves to hear your overall knowledge of a technology and if you speak clearly about the profile of a technology (Normally available in Chapter 1 of these books), you can be sure you chop off 5 minutes of interviewing time and he will move on assuring himself that you know about the technology.

A trick which is normally overlooked, is \"Time\" management. An interviewer would not normally like to spend more than 30 minutes with you. About 5 resumes can be selected for a position. And typically, if the interviewer were to spend 1 hour or more on an interview, he/she will waste 5 hours at the minimum. Its not even about the 5 hours but the repetitiveness of an interview which will irritate an interviewer. Go in front of the mirror and ask yourself \"What is MVC-2 pattern?\" and answer it 5 times. You will know what I mean!!

So, assuming your interview started off very well and the interviewer knows that you are good on fundamentals, he/she will increase the technicality of questions. At that time, politely ask the interviewer to hold on for a minute or two. In the meantime, go and do whatever you want to do.. Come back and apologise and ask him \"What was the question?\". That will make him a little less eager to hear your answer and move on to the next question as soon as possible. Also, there is less chance for him to dig deeper. I am not saying this will work with everyone, but it will work with about 30% of the people who interview you.

So coming back to time management, if you prolong your interview, assuming that you have proved your ability (80% of all the questions answered), you have a good chance to scrape right through without any problems.

Most importantly, try to be professional and mature. If you are 22 or 23 years old, don\'t try to show it off by exploding with answers before the question is finished. Try to gradually work with your answer. There are thousands of solutions to a problem, so if you answer just one and stick to it, it may differ from the solution your interviewer may have in mind.

IMPORTANT: If you don\'t know the answer to a question, Please don\'t say, I DON\"T KNOW.. Thats like saying I HAVE NEVER WORKED WITH THAT... Just tell him/her that you are a little \"rusty\" on the that topic and given an opportunity, you would get upto speed within a short time.


--END OF PART 1--


Disclaimer: This series should be considered my observations and opinions. If you have anything to add or correct, please feel free to message me. Any actions by you after reading this topic related to a job interview will not hold me accountable.

[Vasu]

Praveen,

We will shortly give the section for submitting the interview questions.

And also, if any one didnot find the answer for questions, you can post it in discussion form, then whoever knows the answer will respond you.

[Vasu]

More info regarding the CodeNotes for J2EE book:-

It introduces Java developers to the key database and Web development technologies of the Java 2 platform, Enterprise Edition.(J2EE).

CodeNotes for J2EE
EJB,JDBC,JSP and Servlets
- Edited by Gregory Brill
Random House publishers.

Cost of the Book : $19.95

I went thru the book, its very good, covering all concepts with examples.

[ravipati]

CodeNotes for J2EE bok covering J2EE1.4 or 1.3?

[Vasu]

i guess it is 1.3.

[sanjaykala]

Hi i did mainframe &y2k training from reputed company in delhi in 1998,aand worked for known co in delhi as mainframe programmer for two year upto 2001,then did msc(it) in 2002,
but after that i am off the track and went to u.k in 2004 now in usa.
tell me how to get on job as mainframe programmer pls in detail.


Thanks
Sanjay