Microsoft Placement Paper

Microsoft Placement Paper

1) Written test of one hour

Aptitude questions and in same section some puzzles asked like
make 4 lines in 3 by 3.

dots by covering all the dots. something of these sort will be asked.

Next c-language . in this asked tricky pointers questions and some
questions based on short circuit evaluation etc.
individual cutoff in both the section.
30% will be selected in this round.

2) Group Discussion

This is second elimination round. roughly around 2-3 ppl will be
selected among grp of 10.
Good communication skills are important.
topic given is: Impacts of Internet on Society.

3) Personal Interview.
Here mainly they will ask about project.

Generaly microsoft will be taking about 30 students for internship during
a year. They will be conducting recruitment process for 4 times a year .

Goodluck try your luck in Microsoft.

Microsoft Placement Paper 2

The paper had three sections(I am not sure about the names of the sections, but the times are
correct, trust me!)

Verbal ability 25 qs 20 mts

Mental ability 25 qs 30 mts

Aptitude 20 qs 20 mts

If you just want to go thru the questions, just look at ‘à’

The first section had basic English qs like use of prepositions, articles and two passages (both
windows related):

The first one was about RAM, and how Windows assigns a bit of RAM to each process and
what happens in the case of multi-processing and all that.
The second one was about DLL (Dynamic Linked Library) files and how they get an operation
done.

These passages were followed by a set of questions which were simple if you carefully read the
passage. My advice is that you better read the passages first clearly and only then start to answer the questions that follow. If you try to jump off in the middle to answer, you’ll only end up confused(because the choices given are such). That wraps up this section.

The second section mainly had questions involving union and intersection, for example:
àThere are 2500 people in a club. 800 were drinkers, 1250 were smokers and 400 were both
drinkers and smokers. The number of teetotalers?

There was not much variation from question to question; I mean all were more or less of the
same pattern.
And there were cube-based problems:
àA child was given to paint a cube with the following conditions:
White should face down.
Black and blue should be on the opposite faces.
Golden should be up.
..and some more like this. This was followed by a set of questions which were simple and direct.
The second one was a toughie.

The cube again, with some conditions for colours. It is cut into two halves parallel to the black
faced plane. The first half is cut into 4 equal cubes. And the second part into 32 equal cubes.
The questions were:

Number of cubes with at least one face coloured.
Number of cubes with no face coloured.
Number of cubes which have green on one of their faces.
And some more(this was the last question in the section so I couldn’t get to all).These type of questions can be covered from R.S.Aggarwal verbal and non verbal reasoning.

Microsoft algorithmic paper
You have b boxes and n dollars. If I want any amount of money from 0 to n dollars, you must be able to hand me 0 to b boxes so that I get exactly what I request.” The two questions were “What are the restrictions on b and n, and how is money distributed among the boxes?

What is the sum of the numbers from 1 to 1000?

You are an employer. You have ten employees. Each month, each one of your ten employees gives you ten bags of gold. Each bag of gold has ten pieces of gold in it. Each piece of gold weighs one pound. One of your employees is cheating you by only putting nine pieces of gold in each of his ten bags of gold. You have a scale (not a balance, a scale), and you can only take one measurement from the scale, only one (1) reading.

How can you tell which of the ten employees is cheating you by using this scale and only taking one measurement?

How many points are there on the globe where by walking one mile south, one mile east and one mile north you reach the place where you started.

How would go about finding out where to look for a book in a library? (You do not know how the books are organized beforehand)

Imagine you are standing in front of a mirror, facing it. Raise your left hand. Raise your right hand. Look at your reflection. When you raise your left hand your reflection raises what appears to be his right hand. But when you tilt your head up, your reflection does too, and does not appear to tilt his/her head down. Why is it that the mirror appears to reverse left and right, but not up and down?

You have a bucket of jelly beans. Some are red, some are blue, and some green. With your eyes closed, pick out 2 of a like color. How many do you have to grab to be sure you have 2 of the same?

You are given a scale which you are to use to measure eight balls. Seven of these balls have the same weight: the eigth ball is heavier than the rest. What is theminimum number of weighs you could perform to find the heaviest of the eight balls?. Remmber it’s a scale not a balance. (i.e. It can just tell you if one side is heavier than the other it can’t give you the exact weight).

How would you design a toaster?

How would you design an universal remote control?

How would you design a clock for a blind person?

How many miles of road are there in the US


There are n couples attending a party. Each one shakes hands with the persons he doesn’t know. (Assuming each person knows his/her partner) Mary and John are a couple. John asked the rest of the party-attenders how many times he has shaken hands. Each one gives a unique answer. How many times does Mary shake hands?

Microsoft Examination Papers

What are two methods of retrieving SQL?

What cursor type do you use to retrieve multiple recordsets?

What action do you have to perform before retrieving data from the next result set of a stored procedure?

What is the basic form of a SQL statement to read data out of a table?

What structure can you have the database make to speed up table reads?

What is a “join"?

What is a “constraint"?

What is a “primary key"?

What is a “functional dependency"? How does it relate to database table design?

What is a “trigger"?

What is “index covering” of a query?

What is a SQL view?

Microsoft Examination Papers
(Analytical)

Questions:

If you had an infinite supply of water and a 5 quart and 3 quart pail, how would you measure exactly 4 quarts?

If you could remove any of the 50 states, which state would it be and why?

If you are on a boat and you throw out a suitcase, will the level of water increase?

There are 3 ants at 3 corners of a triangle, they randomly start moving towards another corner. What is the probability that they don’t collide?

Three men were renting a motel figuring the room cost 30 dollars they would pitch in ten a piece. The room was only 25 so they each gave the bell boy ten,(tip)the bellboy didn"t think that would be fair so he gave them each back 1 dollar and kept 2 for himself. What happened to the other dollar?

Thinkers : Microsoft Examination Papers How are M&Ms made?

If you had a clock with lots of moving mechanical parts, you took it apart piece by piece without keeping track of the method of how it was disassembled, then you put it back together and discovered that 3 important parts were not included; how would you go about reassembling the clock?

If you had to learn a new computer language, how would you go about doing it?

You have been assigned to design Bill Gates bathroom. Naturally, cost is not a consideration. You may not speak to Bill. What was the hardest question asked of you so far today?

If MS told you we were willing to invest $5 million in a start up of your choice, what business would you start? Why?

If you could gather all of the computer manufacturers in the world together into one room and then tell them one thing that they would be compelled to do, what would it be?

Explain a scenario for testing a salt shaker.

If you are going to receive an award in 5 years, what is it for and who is the audience?

How would you explain how to use Microsoft Excel to your grandma?

Why is it that when you turn on the hot water in any hotel, for example, the hot water comes pouring out almost instantaneously?

Why do you want to work at Microsoft?

Suppose you go home, enter your house/apartment, hit the light switch, and nothing happens - no light floods the room. What exactly, in order, are the steps you would take in determining what the problem was?

Interviewer hands you a black pen and says nothing but “This pen is red.”

Applications : Microsoft Examination Papers

How can computer technology be integrated in an elevator system for a hundred story office building? How do you optimize for availability? How would variation of traffic over a typical work week or floor or time of day affect this?

How would you implement copy-protection on a control which can be embedded in a document and duplicated readily via the Internet?

Define a user interface for indenting selected text in a Word document. Consider selections ranging from a single sentence up through selections of several pages. Consider selections not currently visible or only partially visible. What are the states of the new UI controls? How will the user know what the controls are for and when to use them?

How would you redesign an ATM?

Suppose we wanted to run a microwave oven from the computer. What kind of software would you write to do this?

What is the difference between an Ethernet Address and an IP address?

How would you design a coffee-machine for an automobile.

If you could add any feature to Microsoft Word, what would it be?

How would you go about building a keyboard for 1-handed users?

How would you build an alarm clock for deaf people?