IBM Placement Paper 24th April 2007, Kolkata

IBM PATTERN & INTERVIEW - 24 APR 2007 - KOLKATA Hi
IBM came to our college on last 24th April 2007 and 207 students sat for the test. Finally 66 got selected & I am one of them.

There were 3 rounds : Aptitude test, GD, interview. (Pls keep your college ID card with u, else they won't let u sit for the test.)

APTITUDE TEST :
55 ques, 60 min time, followed by 15 mins for essay writing. R.S. Agarwal is more than enough. But if u r confident & have practiced enough of apti from any standard book, that will certainly do (I did from TIME materials for placement). But direction test, data sufficiency, venn diagram etc were common from R.S. Agarwal. AT LEAST GET FAMILIAR WITH THE TYPES OF QUES AS  TIME MANAGEMENT IS THE KEY TO SUCCESS IN THIS SECTION.

Section 1 - Verbal part
She performed _ the opera house.(in/at/on etc)

Another qs on preposition-easy.

Synonym-apathetic
_ clown of that circus became famous for his antics.(article)

Article again-easy.

Then a RC on some plants, pollen grains etc. Do it at last if u get time.

Section 2 -
Well guys I don't remember the problems, but it was very easy. Just stay cool and keep pace with time.

Data sufficiency- about 5 qs

Venn diagram- easy, 5 qs. Problem was like- of 600 people,576 use credit cards (VISA,AMEX etc).

Direction sense- 2 or 3 easy qs

Some more qs were there. Follow any standard book & u can definitely do them.

Section 3 - Attention to details
Eg: CBCBCCBBC  CBCBCCBBC  CBCBCCBBC -find who are alike or not.
4 or 5 qs like above.

Then 4 or 5 qs like-  if * represents +,- rep. * etc, find value of 12* 5-7...etc

Section 4 - Technical
Qs from UNIX, DBMS etc.

Eg: which normal form is only and completely key dependent? Which command to use for seeing detail of a command in UNIX (man,info,display,help).

Essay topic- MONEY BRINGS IRRESPONSIBILITY
Be fast but stay calm. Apti is the easiest round- trust me. 129 cleared it.

GROUP DISCUSSION :
13 candidates in a group, 15 mins time, followed by 30 sec for summing up the GD for each candidate. Our topic was- "HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY". Everyone, even who sat silent was specifically asked to speak. But it is better that u speak spontaneously. The round carries lot of marks.

94 cleared the round. (Usually GD isn't elimination round but since too many had cleared apti, they eliminated some in GD in order to shorten the i/w round.)

INTERVIEW :
I won't go into detail of it. A panel of two was there, extremely polite, approachable and friendly.

In technical, they asked about-
C(call by value & ref. etc)
UNIX,OS (shell, kernel etc)
JAVA (exception handling, features of OOP)
DS (linked list)
NETWORKING (http, port etc)

& some more qs on diff subjects. I answered well & confidently, tried to keep a smile on my face to make myself look confident and well-prepared.

Then there were some HR qs like about myself, my results, a prize which I won for writing on cloning, why IBM, what's the difference b/w IT & CSE and like that.

( JUST GO THROUGH THEIR WEBSITE & prepare standard qs like why IBM etc.)

They looked satisfied with what I answered. Then it was over & we shook hands. I was pretty confident about my selection & finally made it.

Do prepare well, be confident and stay calm & you will make it too.
Neelanjana