Hello guys, if you are preparing for System design interviews or Software Design Interviews, then you must have come across System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide by Alex Xu, one of the most popular book on System Design after Designing Data-Intensive Applications by Martin Kleppmann. I first come across Alex Xu on Twitter when one of his image about how HTTPS works went viral. The image was quite detailed and presentable so I start following Alex and then I come across ByteByteGo, his online System design course and his book System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide.
Since then I have read this book a couple of times already and learned a lot about System Design and concepts like Scalability, Caching, API Gateway, Load Balancer, Estimation etc. So much so that I decided to write a review about it.
Since the System design interview has become a crucial part of any Software engineering interview, be it for for beginner or experience developer. The "System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide" has become one of the most essential resource aiming to equip individuals with the knowledge and strategies needed to excel in these high-stakes interviews.
Now that the short review is over, let's deep dive into this book and System design interview in general to find more.
System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide
To understand the worth of the "System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide" in 2024, it's crucial to delve into the evolution of technical interviews. Over the past few years, companies have shifted their focus from assessing only algorithmic problem-solving skills to evaluating a candidate's capacity to design scalable and efficient systems.That's why it's extremely important for developers to learn System Design in depth and that's where book like System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide can help you.
You will not just learn how to solve popular System design questions like how to design YouTube, How to Design WhatSapp, and how to design Rate Limiter but also learn about essential System Design concepts like Scalability, Load balancing, API Gateway, Caching and More.
There are two version of this book, System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide Volume 1 and Volume 2 which was released last year. The volume 2 book adds more case studies and problems like designing a digital payment system etc.
What is best on System Design Interview Book?
Here are a couple of things I really liked about this book:1. Insider Insights
2. Comprehensive Coverage
For example, System Design Interview — An Insider’s Guide (Volume 1) provides solutions to 16 real system design scenarios, offering practical guidance for enterprise architects to enhance their problem-solving skills.
Along the way, the book covers diverse topics, from scaling user traffic to designing complex systems like chat systems and search autocomplete systems.
Similarly, System Design Interview — An Insider’s Guide (Volume 2) provides a four-step framework serving as a systematic approach to system design interviews. Detailed solutions to 13 real system design interview questions and most importantly over 300 diagrams offer visual explanations of various systems.
Along the way it covers topics like proximity services, distributed message queues, and real-time gaming leaderboards, among others.
3. Real-world Examples
4. Diagrams
Also here is a 3-step guide from the book which you can follow while answering any system design interview question:
- Step 1: Ask clarifying questions to narrow the scope and align on requirements because system design interview question intentionally open-ended and there is no right or wrong answer.
- Step 2: Propose a high-level design and get buy-in
- Step 3: Dive deep into the design, including rough calculations, system diagrams, and tradeoffs
Keeping It Fresh.
Is System Design Interview Book worth it?
In the ever-shifting landscape of tech interviews, the question boils down to this: Is the "System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide" still a worthy investment of your time and effort in 2024? It's undeniably a robust resource.Further System Design Interviews Resources
If you are serious about System design interview preparation and need more resources to prepare in depth then here is the curated list of best system design books, online courses, and practice websites which you can check to better prepare for System design interviews. Most of these courses also answer questions I have shared here.
DesignGuru's Grokking System Design Course: An interactive learning platform with hands-on exercises and real-world scenarios to strengthen your system design skills.
"Designing Data-Intensive Applications" by Martin Kleppmann: A comprehensive guide that covers the principles and practices for designing scalable and reliable systems.
LeetCode System Design Tag: LeetCode is a popular platform for technical interview preparation. The System Design tag on LeetCode includes a variety of questions to practice.
"System Design Primer" on GitHub: A curated list of resources, including articles, books, and videos, to help you prepare for system design interviews.
Educative's System Design Course: An interactive learning platform with hands-on exercises and real-world scenarios to strengthen your system design skills.
High Scalability Blog: A blog that features articles and case studies on the architecture of high-traffic websites and scalable systems.
YouTube Channels: Check out channels like "Gaurav Sen" and "Tech Dummies" for insightful videos on system design concepts and interview preparation.
ByteByteGo: A live book and course by Alex Xu for System design interview preparation. It contains all the content of System Design Interview book volume 1 and 2 and will be updated with volume 3 which is coming soon.
Exponent: A specialized site for interview prep especially for FAANG companies like Amazon and Google, They also have a great system design course and many other material which can help you crack FAANG interviews.
image_credit - ByteByteGo
That's all in this review of System Design Interview - An insider's guide volume 1 and volume 2 by Alex Xu and Sahn Lam. In conclusion, the "System Design Interview - An Insider's Guide" holds a pivotal position in the arsenal of resources available to those preparing for technical interviews. It's solution of popular System design problem and its framework to answer any System design question is definitely two of the most important takeaway from the book.
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