Technical and Soft Skills Programming Interview Preparation

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering object-oriented programming concepts, C# language specifics, SQL joins, software architecture, and technical interview questions.

Instance

An individual object created from a class or type, where the class acts as a blueprint and the instance is the actual object built from that blueprint.

Static Method (Class Method)

A method that belongs to the class itself and can be called without creating an object; in C#, it is designated with the static keyword.

Instance Method

A method that belongs to an individual object and requires an instantiated object of the class to be called.

Database Index

A database feature applied to columns to read or retrieve information faster, at the cost of increased storage space and slower write or update operations.

Left Excluding Join

A SQL join query pattern that returns everything in table A that is not in table B, structured as: SELECT * FROM A LEFT JOIN B on B.A_ID = A.ID WHERE B.A_ID IS NULL;.

REST (Representational State Transfer)

A language-independent architecture providing interoperability between computer systems over the Internet via a stateless protocol (utilizing methods such as POST, GET, PUT, and DELETE) for fast performance and reliability.

Fault Tolerance

The ability that enables a system to continue operating properly in the event of the failure of (or one or more faults within) some of its components.

ORM (Object Relational Mapper)

A software abstractor used to access a relational database from an object-oriented programming language (for example, Dapper).

Abstract Class

A base class template that cannot be instantiated on its own, may contain abstract methods and accessors, and requires any derived non-abstract class to implement all inherited abstract members.

C#

A strongly and statically typed object-oriented programming language.

Class

A user-defined blueprint or prototype from which objects are created.

Inheritance

An OOP pillar representing a parent/child relationship where a child class or type inherits functionality from its parent class.

Polymorphism

An OOP pillar meaning 'having many forms,' where two or more different classes/types with differing implementations can be referenced or called in a similar fashion (e.g., method overloading).

Encapsulation

An OOP pillar wherein a class hides internal code and data into a single unit, exposing only the bare essentials necessary to accomplish a given goal.

Abstraction

An OOP pillar where software is built in modular sections that hide unwanted or complex data and expose only relevant concepts, preventing tightly coupled code.

Reference Type

A data type (such as a class) capable of growing or shrinking in allocated memory and supporting inheritance.

Value Type

A data type (such as a struct) that cannot implement inheritance, though it can conform to interfaces.

Microservices

An architectural approach where services are isolated to a single, laser-targeted purpose, making them easy to write, test, and enhance.

Monolith Application

A unified application architecture whose primary advantage is avoiding the need for an external transmission layer (such as repeatedly serializing and deserializing JSON across network calls).

Delegate

A type in C# that represents references to methods with a particular parameter list and return type, allowing associated compatible methods to be invoked through its instance.

.NET Core

An open-source, general-purpose development platform used to create applications across Windows, macOS, and Linux.

Constant (const)

A variable declared and initialized at compile time whose value cannot change, is static by default, can be used in attributes, and is copied into every assembly that uses it.

Readonly Instance Field

A field evaluated when an instance is created whose value is assigned at run time and must be set by the time the constructor exits.

Static Readonly Field

A field evaluated when code execution hits a class reference that must have an evaluated value by the time the static constructor completes.

Namespace

A logical structure used in .NET to organize large code projects and manage the many classes in the ecosystem.

ref

A C# parameter modifier providing two-way data passing by informing the compiler that the object must already be initialized before entering the function.

out

A C# parameter modifier providing out-only data passing by informing the compiler that the object will be initialized inside the function.

MVC

A design pattern standing for Model View Controller.

Palindromic Number

A number that reads the same both ways, from left-to-right and right-to-left.