Application Support Engineer, Mathworks Interview

Interview pattern is good. But the way they conduct it onsite was really bad
1) Phone screening by the TS Manager(Tech Support Manager)(20 mins or so ).Its basically a background check.(Was informed about the technical interview will conduct after 2 days)
2) After 2 days a Telephonic Technical Interview by a Application support Engineer from UK(1 hour)
It consists of Programming skills, Maths, C, MATLAB, Control Theory(One can choose embedded,DSP or control theory)

Maths- Eigen values, eigenvectors, linear diff eqn, partial differential eqn, matrix multiplication, matrix addition,explain differencetion and integration via graphs and their difference, definite n indefine integral, is -inf to +inf indefinite integral, probability prob, singular matrix, identity matrix, dot product etc
MATLAB - difference b/w a*b and a.*b,dot product, cross product in matlab, diffrnec b/w function and scripts, mex functions, workspace, current directory, cell array, transpose, determinant, datatypes in matlab etc
Programming skills - what is x86, x64 n wat do they stand for, string reversal, string palindrome, multicore processor, call by value and reference, pointer, recursive funtions, local and global variables, #define and const difference, mallac, null pointer and its significance, ++a and a++ difference, what is typedef, y we use it, C compilation procedure etc
Control Theory - 2nd order differential eqn, damping ratio, natural req, relationship b/w them, y do we need zeta, stabilty, RH -criterion, LTI systems, ROC, state space representations etc

Well, this one went on good, as I managed to answer more than 95% of them correctly. Even if u dont know try to make an attempt.
After few days of this interview the TS manager called me again for an Onsite interview.

This onsite interview is where things get harder. Even though ppl around acts like friendly but in reality they wern't.

I was told I will be facing a puzzle technical round followed by a application support team meet, video conferencing technical interview,
an casual interview with TS manager nad a few behaviourial round of interviews.

1st Puzzle, Programming Technical interview by a guy 4m developement team:
The guy seemed to be a moron to me. I was asked 3 puzzles and the guy who asked the same didnt put up the questions in the proper way. Finally I forced him to write to down the paper. I explain them here

1 Question: 9 balls out of which one is bigger. how do u find the bigger one. All seems alike. He didnt say that I have a weighing machine. I gave him answer using digital weighing machine. Later
he asked to do with analog weighing. I said it can be done in 3 timesie 4,4,1. He said to optimise it. I couldnt. He only new the answers and ter was no value for yout efforts. The answer was 3,3,3 which can be
resolved in only 2 weighings

2 Question: Bag with 16 red, 15 white, 33 green balls. Number of ways of picking the same. Pick One ball at a time.
I started working with combinations after few minutes he said the answer is simple, I just asked you how many times
I need to put my hand inside bag to get same color. I said him tat he told "Number of ways" to do it. The moron refused it.

Then I said 16+15+1 = times to get green ball
He said he can do tat in 4 ways. I did the above with the ball picking in the succession. I refused it saying he didnt said succession.
Answer: 1 - white, 2-green, 3-red, 4- can be anything. You got 2 colors and they call this as a puzzle. ha ha


3 Question: It was on C. Reverse a string Program.
I wrote and explained him( I used 2 arrays). He said to reduce the memory size WITHOUT USING ANOTHER VARIABLE. I was confused and was trying different.
Later he said he gave a funny clue n said "Do it by swapping".
I told him that one can swap only if he has 2 variables. Then use it he said. I told him tat he had asked me to do it without using another variable. He refused once again
saying that he had only asked me reduce the memory size. I wrote the program with a dummy char variable instead of an array and explained the same.
Still wondering how can Mathworks take such ppl into developement team.


2interview with the Application support engineer:
This is a formal background and get together kind of interview. 2 Application support engineers and me. This is where you get a chance to ask them who they work, whom tey work,
work environment etc. It was a good one indeed. They offered snacks and behaved like friends.


3interview(Pure technical)video conferencing with the US guy

Again the same Math, Matlab, Control Theory, Programming skills

Matlab - why, who, which command, subfunctions
Control Theory - asks you solve the problems. Lots of problems. Eigen values,vectors. Lapnov Stability, obeserbility,system controllable or not kind of prob
I answered and solved the problems but I didnt noe Lapnav stability and couldnt solve its problem



4th interview with TS manager:
I was totally Pissed off by the time and he gave only 4 mins for me to refresh. As I entered the interview room, he started asking me behavioural question

Y mathworks?? what challenge do you find in this job??I said customer prob is my challenge. "What else one can expect a challenge for an Application Support engineer".
Ur strenghts( I kept silent for 4 mins. I was totally out of mind I needed some break and waterto drink, he offered it).
Strengths??, weakness??, greatest disappointment??, what does ur current manager say about u??, wat do u think about ur manager??,
Again what challenges in this job?? ur greatest disappointment??, Ur acheivement??, Ur rewards for the same??, I told him tat ter plans of
doing my Phd 4m IISc while answering these questions. After how many yrs u wanted to do it??I said 3yrs 4m nw. Y only IISc?? Why Phd??U want to call urself a Dr. is it???
That's it. I was out. He said he couldnt able to process me further until technical results wer out.

I never sounded negative in my thoughts but I took a break during this interview which may sound odd to him. I wonder that was an behaviral or stress interview.
I was disappointed not because I was not selected, but because of the way the interview was conducted.

The next day my application in there website turned to "MATCH NOT IDEAL THIS TIME"

-----JUST A WASTE OF TIME-----