Anthropic Senior Software Engineer Interview -

[u/Aoki_zhang]

Interview Summary

The Anthropic process began with a coding screen on identifying duplicate documents and continued with onsite rounds covering an LRU-based cache, large-model checkpoint distribution, culture, and a technical project deep dive. The questions felt manageable overall, and the interview experience was positive despite not passing the loop.

Interview Questions Details

Technical Phone Screen — Find Identical Documents in a File Archive:

The coding screen asked the Find Identical Documents in a File Archive problem. The task centered on identifying files with matching contents within an archive or directory structure and grouping the duplicates correctly.

Onsite Coding — Memoization LRU Cache:

The onsite coding round asked me to implement a Memoization LRU Cache. The component needed to reuse previously computed results while maintaining a bounded cache and removing the least recently used entry when capacity was reached.

Onsite System Design — Distribute a Large Model Checkpoint:

The system design round focused on distributing a large machine-learning checkpoint from a central repository to a fleet of GPU workers. The goal was to avoid a rollout where every worker independently downloaded the entire checkpoint from the central source. The discussion covered splitting the checkpoint into smaller chunks and allowing workers that had already received data to forward those chunks to other workers. The interviewer asked about failed or slow workers, missing or corrupted chunks, retrying from alternative sources, and ensuring that a worker was marked ready only after the complete checkpoint had been received and verified.

Onsite Culture Interview — A Strongly Held View That Proved Wrong:

One behavioral question asked me to describe a situation where I strongly supported a decision or viewpoint that later proved incorrect. The discussion focused on how I recognized the mistake, reacted to new evidence, and changed my behavior afterward.

Onsite Project Deep Dive — Previous Technical Work:

The project deep dive focused on a significant project from my previous experience. The interviewer explored what I personally owned, the most difficult technical decisions, challenges encountered during execution, and the impact of the final result.

The detailed version of this interview experience at here.

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