Thread: Linux job interview questions

good idea, I am about to start a 4 year degree and it’s going to have a lot of Linux in it, so this is a thread I will learn off by heart!

One I got interviewing for Ecommerce.com position.

Why doesn’t this work?

Code:

$ for nr in `seq -w 0 10`; do printf "%2i\n" $nr; done
 0
 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
-bash: printf: 08: invalid number
 0
-bash: printf: 09: invalid number
 0
10

I had to research this because I couldn’t answer on the spot. I emailed the answer back after the interview.

printf is interpreting ‘0’ padded numbers as octals and
complaining about 08 and 09. Removing the ‘-w’ option to seq will
prevent the padding.

Code:

$ for nr in `seq 0 10`; do printf "%2i\n" $nr; done
 0
 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10

Same interview, I couldn’t answer why whatever fedora version couldn’t install on > 2TB partition. Answer was Not able to use GPT.

Same interview – what I like to drink. My answer to the interviewer – whatever you’re buying.

holy crap I got some learning to do!

Originally Posted by Outlaw

One I got interviewing for Ecommerce.com position.

Why doesn’t this work?

…

Same interview, I couldn’t answer why whatever fedora version couldn’t install on > 2TB partition. Answer was Not able to use GPT.

Same interview – what I like to drink. My answer to the interviewer – whatever you’re buying.

Wow, I couldn’t have answered the first one, I would have had to look it up also Outlaw.

The second one I would have gotten, I have actually encountered this, or else I doubt I would have known it. Beez, here is a link to an article that lays out GPT pretty well.

Outlaw, your second answer is priceless! I only wish I could be that quick-witted in an interview.Kudos!