IT Job Interview

Systems Questions

Senior Information Systems Analyst Interview

A government agency funded a 3-year project for data integration/consolidation among several agencies. A couple of Information System Analyst positions were planned to be filled for this project. The interview process is outlined below. At start of the interview, a written description of the position and the project was given to the […]

Please Describe How ‘cron’ Command Works in UNIX?

‘Cron’ is a command whose services are initialized when the system is brought up in multiuser mode.  When loaded, it executes commands at specified dates and times.  It runs in background as a clock daemon until it is killed either by the ‘super’ user or when the system shuts down or ‘init’ed in a mode […]

Describe the Steps for Adding a Workstation with an Operating System to Your TCP/IP Network

This is a hands-on experience question.  The following answer is for UNIX platform.
The first step is to assign a unique internet address to the workstation.  The net-mask has to be assigned the same as other devices in that subnet.  The physical device has to be attached to the network, and the workstation connected.  When attaching […]

Describe the Types of UNIX Shells with Which You are Familiar?

Not just give a list of shells you have used, try to describe some of the key features of the shells, showing you have the real experience on them.
“I got used to the Bourne shell for early versions of Unix.  Then I become accustomed to the Korne shell and happen to like it very much.   […]

What are Daemons? Can You Give Some Examples?

Daemons are processes that are run when the system is initialized and continue to run while the system is in operation.  Their purpose is to wait in the background until their services are required.
The most common daemon is the cron daemon.  Here are more examples:  rpc.mountd, nfsd, mountd & biod (NFS daemons), lpd (line printer […]

What Diagnostic Tools Have You Used to Troubleshoot Your Network in UNIX Platform?

Obviously, the interviewer wants to know if you have any hands-on skills on UNIX network troubleshooting.  If you do have the experience, you must have used the following handy tools:
Netstat – Shows the status of the network.
Ping – Sends packets to a destination address and tracks the performance of packets round trip.
Spray – sends packets […]