HPE Interview Experience | On-Campus 2021
On 11th August, Hewlett Packard Enterprise visited my college campus for recruitment in 2 Job roles. One role was of Aruba Intern Hiring and the other was of R&D Intern Hiring.
The hiring process had 4 parts in it-
Part 1(Online Test – 100 mins): The test was divided into 3 sections-
Section-1: 20 Aptitude questions -> Difficulty level: Medium
Quantitative, Logical Reasoning, Error correction, Time & work, Age problems, and Probability finding questions were there.
Section-2: 30 Technical questions -> Difficulty level: High
- Questions from Networking, OS, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Big data, Computer Architecture were there.
- No questions from Programming languages and OOPs.
Section-3: Coding questions -> Difficulty level: Easy
- This was mentioned as an optional section. Any 2 out of 3 questions were required to be done in 20 mins each. But we had to choose the questions without reading them.
- After this round, only 91 students went ahead for interviews out of the total of 350 students.
Part 2(Technical Interview -1 hour 10 mins):
First Half: Coding questions from my preferred programming language and DSA concepts were asked. The interviewer gave me the link to an online code editor and asked me to share my screen.
- No introduction. No questions on my projects.
- I told him that I work in C/C++ so he asked me about what a static variable is. He asked me to declare a local and global static variable and tell the difference between them. https://www.w3wiki.net/static-variables-in-c/
- Next question was on the void pointer. He asked me to declare a void pointer and a variable of void type and whether there will be an error or not. Be very attentive while listening to such questions and take your time to answer them. https://www.w3wiki.net/void-pointer-c-cpp/
- Then he asked me to write the code of Linked List and print the data of the given index. https://www.w3wiki.net/print-nodes-of-linked-list-at-given-indexes/
- Next question was to write the code to find out whether there is a loop in LL or not. https://www.w3wiki.net/detect-loop-in-a-linked-list/ (Linked List is one of the favorite topics of HPE so prepare well for it!)
- Then he gave me different conditions in the if statement and asked whether the if block will run or not.
Second Half: Practical knowledge-based questions of Operating Systems (OS) and Networking were asked.
- What is a deadlock? What are the necessary conditions for it? How to prevent it. https://www.w3wiki.net/introduction-of-deadlock-in-operating-system/. https://www.w3wiki.net/deadlock-prevention/
- What are semaphore and mutex? How do they work in OS? https://www.w3wiki.net/mutex-vs-semaphore/
- Next he asked me if I know about the OSI model and its layers. Further, he asked me if I have a Router at my home. Then he asked me about how does it find the best route to transfer the data. https://www.w3wiki.net/introduction-of-a-router/
- Next question was on NIC and on which layer does it reside. https://www.w3wiki.net/nic-full-form/
- Next he asked me to tell about some Protocols that are used by layers of the OSI model and how do those protocols work. https://www.w3wiki.net/layers-of-osi-model/
- Some questions were on Switches and on which layer they reside. https://www.w3wiki.net/switch-functions-at-layer-2/
Now once I was done with the Technical round, the journey was quite smooth.
Part 3(Managerial Round – 30 mins): As I was shortlisted for the Aruba Role after the test, one thing that was different for this role was that Managerial Round was more like a Technical Interview.
- Introduction in brief
- The interviewer asked me about my interest in Networking subject. I answered that I love to know about what is going on behind the scene when I type www.google.com. So the next question was on DNS and what happens when we type a URL in the browser. https://www.w3wiki.net/what-happens-when-we-type-a-url/
- For the next 15 mins, there was a discussion on Linux and how much I know about it. (Aruba, HPE works majorly on Linux. So do not say that you don’t know anything about Linux or you have more interest in any other OS)
- Basic question on whether I have any plans for further studies or not.
Part 4(HR Round – 10 mins):
- Give your introduction in detail.
- How much do you know about HPE?
- Why do you want to join HPE?
- What is your parents’ occupation?
- Tell me about one learning that you got from the pandemic?
- Do you have any plans for further studies?
Then we had a discussion about my role and the day-to-day responsibilities.
After 2 days, the results were announced and I got selected for the Intern + Full-time role. A total of 14 students were selected from my college.