I applied through an employee referral. The process took 1 week. I interviewed at Nutanix in Oct 2013
Interview
I am a kernel/systems developer and have worked on large distributed systems with past experience working on block drivers and distributed storage. Was referred by a acquaintance. Phone interview was about systems programming and general OS stuff. Was invited for onsite. I had 4 interviews. Only one person asked anything close to what I have been doing. The last two interviewers asked me questions fit for a fresh graduate. It was a problem solving question and another was a programming question related to parsing text. I could not understand what this had to do with my experience or skills. I was hoping for more algorithm related questions or systems programming related questions.
Asked questions about hardware , ip address dns, ram, storage , cloud , nutanix concepts , asked multiple questions about everything and nic card works and what it is and also asked about extracurriculars
The interview process consisted of multiple rounds, including an initial recruiter screening, a hiring manager discussion, and several technical interviews. The technical rounds focused on distributed storage systems, Linux internals, troubleshooting, Python automation, test design, and scalability challenges.
The interviewers were professional and knowledgeable. Many questions were based on real-world scenarios involving storage clusters, debugging production issues, and designing automated test frameworks. There was also discussion around Ceph, file systems, performance bottlenecks, and cross-functional collaboration.
The overall process was thorough but fair and gave candidates a good opportunity to demonstrate both technical depth and practical problem-solving skills.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
How would you troubleshoot a performance issue in a distributed storage cluster when users report increased latency but the cluster health appears normal?
The process began with an online assessment containing 50 MCQs covering networking, OS internals, virtualization, and Linux commands. This was followed by two in-depth technical interview rounds focusing heavily on live systems troubleshooting scenarios, SSH debugging, and hypervisor concepts. The final round was a comprehensive managerial and cultural fit interview with the support leadership team.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Explain what an Operating System is, and then trace how an OS boots from scratch, without using complex technical jargon, as if you are explaining it to a non-technical person.
