Covered Skills
Testing of these skills is covered in this pre-built test because they’re closely related. On our paid plan, you can easily create your own custom multi-skill tests.
Python
Python
Python is a widely used, high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Having a basic familiarity with the programming language used on the job is a prerequisite for quickly getting up to speed.
Bug fixing
Bug fixing
Everyone makes mistakes. A good programmer should be able to find and fix a bug in their or someone else's code.
Language
Language
A programmer should use a language as a tool, always taking advantage of language-specific data types and built-in functions.
SQL
SQL
SQL is the dominant technology for accessing application data. It is increasingly becoming a performance bottleneck when it comes to scalability. Given its dominance, SQL is a crucial skill for all engineers.
Conditions
Conditions
Conditional statements are a feature of most programming and query languages. They allow the programmer to control what computations are carried out based on a Boolean condition.
Views
Views
A database view is a result set that is defined by a stored query, the results of which can can also be queried. As a fundamental and widely used database construct, it's useful for candidates to understand how and when they should be used.
List comprehension
List comprehension
A list comprehension is a syntactic construct for creating a list based on existing lists. As this is a common task, every programmer should be familiar with it.
Strings
Strings
The string data structure is used to represent text. It is one of the most commonly used data structures. Therefore, every programmer should be skilled at string manipulation.
Arithmetic
Arithmetic
Arithmetic is a fundamental branch of mathematics. An understanding of arithmetic concepts, and their application, is important for every candidate.
Exceptions
Exceptions
Exceptions exist in most modern programming languages, making it important for a programmer to understand them and know how to handle them.
Monkey patching
Monkey patching
Monkey Patching is a method of either adding new or overriding existing functionality without the creation of a new type. As such it's an important tool for developers to be familiar with.
Constraints
Constraints
Constraints are used to define rules and relationships. They are applied to a dataset. A constraint may take many forms, such as x ≤ 5 in a programming language and a NOT NULL constraint in a SQL table definition.
Create table
Create table
The CREATE TABLE statement is used to create a new table in a database. It is an essential command when creating new database.
Database schema
Database schema
A database schema defines how data is stored in a database. An SQL database uses a schema to define tables consisting of rows and columns that use fixed data types to store data. Formalizing how data is stored is the first step towards building an application or service.
Select
Select
The SELECT statement is used to select data from a database. It is the most used SQL command.
Create index
Create index
The CREATE INDEX statement is used to create indexes for tables. Indexes are used to retrieve data from the database more quickly. They are very important for making performant queries.
Performance tuning
Performance tuning
The performance of an application or system is important. The responsiveness and scalability of an application are all related to how performant an application is. Each algorithm and query can have a large positive or negative effect on the whole system.
Alter table
Alter table
The ALTER TABLE statement is used to add, delete, or modify columns and constraints in an existing table. Alter table statements are important for all programmers who have to modify existing schemas.
Dictionary
Dictionary
A dictionary (or associative array) is a data type composed of a collection of key-value pairs, where each possible key appears at most once in the collection. It is used when we need to access items by their keys.
Linked list
Linked list
A linked list is a linear collection of data elements where each element points to the next. It is a data structure consisting of a collection of nodes which together represent a sequence. It is usually used for advanced scenarios where we need fast access to the next element, or when we need to remove an element from anywhere in the collection.
Aggregation
Aggregation
An aggregate function is typically used in database queries to group together multiple rows to form a single value of meaningful data. A good programmer should be skilled at using data aggregation functions when interacting with databases.
Subqueries
Subqueries
Subqueries are commonly used in database interactions, making it important for a programmer to be skilled at writing them.
Ordering
Ordering
Knowing how to order data is a common task for every programmer.
Left join
Left join
LEFT JOIN is one of the ways to merge rows from two tables. We use it when we also want to show rows that exist in one table, but don't exist in the other table.
Indexes
Indexes
The proper implementation and use of indexes are important for improving the performance of database queries.
Union
Union
The UNION operator is used to combine the result-set of two or more SELECT statements. It is often used when a report needs to be made based on multiple tables.
Group by
Group by
The GROUP BY statement groups rows by some attribute into summary rows. It is a common command when making various reports.
Update
Update
The UPDATE statement is used to modify the existing records in a table and is one of the most used operations for working with the database.
Insert
Insert
Even though most database insert queries are simple, a good programmer should know how to handle more complicated situations like batch inserts.
Joins
Joins
A normalized database is normally made up of multiple tables. Joins are, therefore, required to query across multiple tables.
Serialization
Serialization
Familiarity with data serialization to and from formats such as XML and JSON is important as it is commonly used for interprocess communication
XML
XML
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language that defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable. The design goals of XML emphasize simplicity, generality, and usability across the Internet. This is one of the most used formats for exchanging data over the web.
Regex
Regex
A regular expression (regex) is a special text string for describing a search pattern. It is a common way for extracting data from text.
JSON
JSON
JSON is an open-standard format that uses human-readable text to transmit data objects consisting of attribute-value pairs. It's the most common data format used for asynchronous browser/server communication.
Sorting
Sorting
Every programmer should be familiar with data-sorting methods, as sorting is very common in data-analysis processes.
Inheritance
Inheritance
In object-oriented programming, inheritance is the mechanism of basing a class upon another class, retaining similar implementation. Inheritance allows programmers to reuse code and is a must know topic for every programmer who works with OOP languages.
OOP
OOP
Object-oriented programming is a paradigm based on encapsulating logic and data into objects, which may then contain fields and procedures. Many of the most widely used programming languages are based on OOP, making it a very important concept in modern programming.
Delete
Delete
The delete statement is used to delete records in a table and is one of the four basic CRUD functions (create, read, update, and delete) required for working with any persistent storage.
SQL CASE
SQL CASE
The CASE statement is SQL's control statement. It goes through conditions and returns a value.
Algorithmic thinking
Algorithmic thinking
When designing and/or analyzing an algorithm or data structure, it is important to consider the performance and structure of an implementation. Algorithmic thinking is one of the key traits of a good programmer, especially one working on complex or performance-critical code.
Tuples
Tuples
A tuple is an immutable collection which is ordered and unchangeable. It is a common collection in many programming languages.
Stream
Stream
A stream is a sequence of data elements made available over time. It is particularly useful for tasks that may benefit from being asynchronous, including tasks such as I/O processing or reading from a file, and as such is important for developers to understand.
Queue
Queue
A queue is a collection of items that are maintained in a sequence and can be modified by the addition of entities at one end of the sequence and removal from the other end of the sequence. It is the collection to be used when first-in-first-out (FIFO) collection is needed.
Named tuple
Named tuple
Named Tuple is a tuple where each value has a preassigned name. It allows accessing values not just by index, but also by name. Among other things, it can increase the readability and maintainability of the code.
Lists
Lists
Lists are collections that act as dynamic arrays. Lists offer the flexibility of dynamically sized arrays, the simplicity of access of arrays, and are more performant than more ubiquitous collections in most scenarios.
Iteration
Iteration
Iteration is the act of repeating a process, or cycling through a collection. Iteration is one of the fundamental flow control tools available to developers.
Set
Set
A set is a collection of distinct objects. It's one of the most used types of collection, alongside arrays, lists, and maps. There are many different types of set, each with multiple specific optimizations and use cases. It is, therefore, one of the most important collections for a developer to be familiar with.
Graphs
Graphs
Many real-life situations are best modeled by graphs. Therefore, an in-depth knowledge of graph data structures is important for a good programmer.
Dynamic Objects
Dynamic Objects
Dynamic objects expose members such as properties and methods at run time, instead of at compile time. This enables you to create objects to work with structures that do not match a static type or format.
Multithreading
Multithreading
Multi-threading allows a process to make more efficient use of modern hardware by allowing code to execute asynchronously. It can drastically improve the performance of any app; however, it can be tricky to get right, making this an important topic for any programmer.
Synchronization
Synchronization
When using multithreading, developers need to know how to make one thread wait for another to finish its task before continuing with its work.
Random
Random
Random number generators are used to generate random numbers and/or symbols. There are a wide variety of random number generators each with very specific use cases, as such it's important for all developers to know and understand when to use each type.
Tree
Tree
A tree is a hierarchical structure defined recursively starting with the root node, where each node is a data structure consisting of a value, together with a list of references to other nodes (the "children"). A lot of problems can be solved efficiently with trees, which makes them important for developers.
Method overriding
Method overriding
Method overriding, in object-oriented programming, is a language feature that allows a subclass to provide a specific implementation of a method that is already provided by one of its parent classes.
Integer division
Integer division
Integer division is division in which the fractional part (remainder) is discarded. Knowing this is important for optimal implementation of some algorithms and for avoiding common bugs.
CTE
CTE
A CTE (Common Table Expression) is a temporary result set that can be referenced within another SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, or DELETE statement. Recursive CTEs can reference themselves, which enables developers to work with hierarchical data.
Right join
Right join
RIGHT JOIN is one of the ways to merge rows from two tables. We use it when we also want to show rows that exist in one table, but don't exist in the other table.
Database normalization
Database normalization
Database normalization is the process of structuring a relational database in accordance with a series of so-called normal forms in order to reduce data redundancy and improve data integrity. It should be used to avoid undesirable side-effects such as update, insert, and delete anomalies.
Recommended Job Roles
These are the job roles that we recommend for the Python and SQL online test.
Back-End Developer