This workshop has already taken place. You are viewing archived materials from the event.

Before you start ...

The job candidate tells the group which job field they're looking into (ie: front-end web development, data science, SEO marketing). You should also tell the group your general experience level with Python: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, or Expert.

Question

Interviewer to ask the question(s) in bold.

Q1: Describe a benefit that Python has over other programming languages.

Additional practice questions, if you have finished practicing with the first one:

Q2: How is memory managed in Python?

Q3: State the difference between tuples and lists in Python.

Potential Clarifications

(The job candidate (JC) and interviewer (I) can ask clarifying questions to each other as part of the practice.) Possible clarifying questions:

If looking for the JC to elaborate further on their response…….

I: Can you describe how you have experienced this benefit when working with Python?

JC: Certainly. I discovered this benefit of Python when….

If the JC needs to provide an additional example:.

I: What other benefits have you experienced using Python?

JC: Yes, another benefit I find with Python is ___________ which I have seen on several occasions when I have __________. (Tip: You can use the STAR technique here!)

Answer Strategy

“Show, Don’t Tell!” Always show your knowledge by sharing a story or describing a project to illustrate your experience.

1. Share your opinion/perspective. Answer the question concisely based on your knowledge or perspective.

2. Provide a specific example. This an opportunity to showcase any firsthand experience or skills related to your answer. When providing an example, an effective strategy to use is the STAR technique:

• Situation: Who? What? When? Where?
• Task: What were your responsibilities?
• Action: What actions did you take? (not the team)
• Result: What were your learnings/successes?

In the case of our practice question, you should aim to show not only your fundamental knowledge of Python, but also your firsthand example of when you used Python. This gives you more time to shine and can lead to a more robust conversation.

Example:

🆇 Answer 1: It has extensive support libraries.

✅ Answer 3: I find Python to be more efficient and productive because of the clean object-oriented designs. It is also great for scripting and rapid prototyping. (opinion/perspective)

I was able to experience this benefit myself. One time, I was part of a team working on building an internal reporting tool for a blogging site that uses information from an existing database to determine which posts were most popular with readers. (Situation)

I was tasked with creating a reporting tool that prints out reports based on the data in the database. (Task)

For the reporting tool, I used a Python program to connect to the database. (Action)

I created a new internal tool that provided data to backup new business decisions. The reporting tool was able to very quickly add usable, meaningful graphs for arbitrary data queries. (Result)

(Optional: Scroll to the bottom of the page to find some more examples of how a job candidate can use this to answer.)

Sample Answers

We have provided sample answers to the practice questions for your reference. Feel free to refer to these answers in your practice, then add your personal story as a way to show your experience. Remember: the goal is to use this opportunity to practice how you approach answering the question.

Question 1: Describe a benefit that Python has over other programming languages.

Here is a list of benefits. Be sure to incorporated your own example to illustrate your point, and showcase your experience:

• Extensive Support Libraries: It provides large standard libraries that include the areas like string operations, Internet, web service tools, operating system interfaces and protocols. Most of the highly used programming tasks are already scripted into it, which limits the length of the codes to be written in Python.Python comprises of a huge standard library for most Internet platforms like Email, HTML, etc.
• Python does not require explicit memory management as the interpreter itself allocates the memory to new variables and free them automatically
• Having the built-in data types saves programming time and effort. It lowers the cognitive load that goes into considering memory management and static typing.
• Integration Feature: Python integrates the Enterprise Application Integration that makes it easy to develop Web services by invoking COM or COBRA components. It has powerful control capabilities as it calls directly through C, C++ or Java via Jython. Python also processes XML and other markup languages as it can run on all modern operating systems through same byte code
• Productivity: With its strong process integration features, unit testing framework and enhanced control capabilities contribute towards the increased speed for most applications and productivity of applications. It is a great option for building scalable multi-protocol network applications.
• Improved Programmer’s Productivity: The language has extensive support libraries and clean object-oriented designs that increase two to ten fold of programmer’s productivity while using languages like Java, VB, Perl, C, C++ and C#

Tip: If you're going to make comparisons to another language when answering this question, be sure to compare it to a language that you know. For example, if you assert it's faster to work in than another language, but you haven't worked in that language, you may be inviting the interviewer to ask you questions about another language that you can't answer. Focus on talking about topics that will make you appear more knowledgable in an interview!

Question 2: How is memory managed in Python?

These are all potential ways to answer.

Answer A: In Python, memory is managed in a private heap space. This means that all the objects and data structures will be located in a private heap. However, the programmer won’t be allowed to access this heap. Instead, the Python interpreter will handle it. At the same time, the core API will enable access to some Python tools for the programmer to start coding. The memory manager will allocate the heap space for the Python objects while the inbuilt garbage collector will recycle all the memory that’s not being used to boost available heap space.

Answer B: Memory management in python is managed by Python private heap space. All Python objects and data structures are located in a private heap. The programmer does not have access to this private heap. The python interpreter takes care of this instead. The allocation of heap space for Python objects is done by Python’s memory manager. The core API gives access to some tools for the programmer to code. Python also has an inbuilt garbage collector, which recycles all the unused memory and so that it can be made available to the heap space.

Answer C: Python interpreter handles the memory management. It uses private heaps to control and maintain the memory. In python the user does not get any access related to its memory management, python memory management takes control of all the memory action by itself. Python has an automatic garbage collector

Tip: In a real interview, an interviewer might ask a follow-up ask a follow-up question like "Where does this get the python programmer into trouble?" Interviews are conversations, so be ready to elaborate on your response depending on what the interviewer chooses to focus on next.

Question 3: State the difference between tuples and lists in Python.

Answer A: The main difference between lists and a tuples is the fact that lists are mutable whereas tuples are immutable. A mutable data type means that a python object of this type can be modified.

Answer B: The key difference is that tuples are immutable. This means that you cannot change the values in a tuple once you have created it. So if you're going to need to change the values use a List. Benefits to tuples include:

1. Slight performance improvement.
2. As a tuple is immutable it can be used as a key in a dictionary.
3. If you can't change it neither can anyone else, which is to say you don't need to worry about any API functions, etc. changing your tuple without being asked.

Tip: For open-ended questions, there isn't just one way to answer the question well. For example, here we have provided two example answers that are both ways you could respond to the question. However, one thing to note is that Answer B gives more comprehensive details than Answer A.