Code With Cisco
It was a coding competition. There were three questions in the coding round.
Distribution: (Time: 1 hour, Date: 28th June 2023)
- 1st was easy-medium: It was a normal greedy-based question
- 2nd was medium-hard: It was based on 3D dp.
- 3rd was Hard: It was a DP question.
All of the above questions were new. Out of the above three questions, our team could solve 2 of them. Overall, I would categorise it more on the tough side, so we were pretty much happy and hoped for the best.
After around 1 week, shortlisted teams were announced. Sadly our team couldn’t qualify for it.
I lost all hope to appear for the interview because as mentioned earlier only candidates from qualified teams would stand a chance for the interview.
Fast forward to Sept 1, 2023. I received an email from Cisco.
We appreciate your participation in Code with Cisco.
While you were unable to qualify for the in-person Code-a-thon event, we are pleased to inform you that all members of your team will have an opportunity to attend an additional round of individual Cisco online assessments.
The online assessment was scheduled for 4th Sept 2023. Duration: (90 mins)
It had three roles, of which one had to be selected. Those were :
- Software engineering
- Application
- Networking
The test consisted of 42 questions. Out of which 40 were MCQ type (on CS fundamentals) and 2 coding questions. One thing that was strange about the assessment was, that for coding questions, there was only C, Python and Java available. Yes, C++ was not available.
- 40 MCQ questions, all were of EASY level: It had questions on Networking and Operating systems.
- 2 coding-based questions, both were Medium level: But as C++ wasn’t available. I could partially solve the first question but could not solve the second question.
I was pretty sure that I was not alone and faced difficulty with coding questions due to the unavailability of C++. Though I was prepared to receive a rejection, but down I had a sense of feeling, that I might qualify the for round.
Sept 8th, 2023
I received an email stating that I have qualified for the round. I was quite happy to see the mail. There were 2-3 prep talks organised by them for us to know about Cisco, work culture for interns, projects they work on and much more.