Data Engineer Interview Questions
Data Engineer Interview Questions
Data engineering is the process of designing, building, and managing systems that collect, store, and
process data at scale. It focuses on creating efficient data pipelines that transform raw data into a
structured and usable format for analysis, reporting, and machine learning.
1. Data Ingestion – Collecting data from different sources (databases, APIs, logs, etc.).
2. Data Processing – Cleaning, transforming, and aggregating raw data.
3. Data Storage – Managing databases, data warehouses, and data lakes.
4. Data Pipeline Development – Automating data workflows using tools like Apache Airflow.
5. Performance Optimization – Ensuring scalability and efficiency in data processing.
6. Security & Governance – Implementing data access controls and compliance policies.
Without data engineering, organizations cannot efficiently manage or analyze large amounts of data. It
ensures that data scientists and analysts have clean, structured, and reliable data for making informed
decisions.
Are you interested in learning data engineering, or do you need it for a project? 🚀
Data modeling is the process of designing and structuring data in a way that defines relationships,
constraints, and storage formats to ensure efficient data management and retrieval. It helps in
organizing data logically and making it easier to work with for databases, applications, and analytics.
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1. Conceptual Data Model – High-level overview of data and relationships (used in business
discussions).
2. Logical Data Model – Defines entities, attributes, and relationships without considering physical
storage.
3. Physical Data Model – Specifies how data is stored in a database (tables, indexes, constraints).
Are you working on database design or looking to improve your data modeling skills? 😊
what are the data schemas that are used while performing data modeling
A data schema defines the structure of how data is stored, organized, and related within a database.
When performing data modeling, different schema types are used based on the requirements of the
system.
1. Star Schema ⭐
Structure: One fact table connected to multiple dimension tables.
Use Case: OLAP (Online Analytical Processing), data warehousing, business intelligence.
Pros: Simple, easy to query, optimized for reporting.
Cons: Data redundancy in dimension tables.
Example:
Fact Table: Sales (OrderID, ProductID, CustomerID, Revenue)
Dimension Tables: Product (ProductID, Name), Customer (CustomerID, Location)
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2. Snowflake Schema ❄️
Structure: An extension of the Star Schema where dimension tables are normalized.
Use Case: Large-scale data warehouses with complex hierarchies.
Pros: Reduces data redundancy, saves storage.
Cons: More complex queries due to multiple joins.
Example:
Fact Table: Sales
Dimension Tables: Product → Category, Customer → Region
Schema Follows a predefined schema (fixed structure). No predefined schema, flexible structure.
Processing Easily searchable and processed using SQL. Requires AI/ML, NLP, or custom algorithms.
Examples Customer records, transaction logs, sales data. Emails, social media posts, PDFs, sensor data.
Use Cases Financial systems, CRMs, ERP software, reporting. AI, Big Data, content management, IoT.
Key Differences:
1. Structure – Structured data is neatly organized in tables, while unstructured data lacks a defined
format.
2. Storage & Querying – Structured data is stored in relational databases (SQL), whereas
unstructured data is stored in NoSQL databases, data lakes, or files.
3. Processing Methods – Structured data can be easily queried using SQL, but unstructured data
requires AI, ML, or data processing tools like Apache Spark.
Some data doesn't fit strictly into either category, like JSON, XML, and sensor logs. These have some
structure but lack the rigid format of structured data.
Would you like to know about specific tools to manage unstructured data? 🚀
what is hadoop
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Provides redundancy via replication (default: 3 copies).
2. MapReduce 🗺️➡️📊
A programming model for parallel data processing.
Map phase: Splits and processes data in parallel.
Reduce phase: Aggregates and combines results.
3. YARN (Yet Another Resource Negotiator) ⚙️
Manages resources and job scheduling across Hadoop clusters.
Enables multiple applications to run simultaneously.
4. HBase (Hadoop Database) 🛢️
A NoSQL database that works on top of HDFS for real-time data access.
5. Hive 🐝
A SQL-like query language (HiveQL) for querying large datasets in Hadoop.
6. Pig 🐷
A scripting language (Pig Latin) for data transformation and analysis.
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What is NameNode in HDFS? 📂🔍
In Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS), the NameNode is the master node responsible for
managing the metadata and directory structure of the file system. It does not store actual data but
keeps track of where data blocks are stored across the DataNodes.
1. Metadata Management 🗂️
Stores the directory structure, file names, permissions, and block locations.
Maintains the fsimage (snapshot of the file system) and edit logs (record of recent changes).
2. Namespace Management 📁
Handles the hierarchical structure of HDFS files and directories.
Ensures consistency and integrity of the file system.
3. Block Mapping 📦
Keeps a mapping of file names to block locations on DataNodes.
When a client requests a file, NameNode provides the block locations.
4. Failure Detection & Replication Control 🔄
Monitors DataNodes and ensures data replication for fault tolerance.
If a DataNode fails, it triggers replication of lost blocks to other nodes.
If the NameNode fails, the entire HDFS becomes inaccessible since metadata is lost.
To prevent data loss, a Standby NameNode or Secondary NameNode is used to store backup
metadata.
Limitation Solution
Single Point of Failure (SPOF) Use High Availability (HA) with Active & Standby NameNode.
Memory Constraints (Stores metadata in Scale horizontally or use Federated NameNode to distribute
RAM) metadata load.
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Would you like to see an example of HDFS file operations using the NameNode? 🚀
python
#!/usr/bin/env python3
import sys
for line in sys.stdin:
words = line.strip().split()
for word in words:
print(f"{word}\t1") # Emit key-value pairs (word, 1)
python
#!/usr/bin/env python3
import sys
from collections import defaultdict
word_count = defaultdict(int)
for line in sys.stdin:
word, count = line.strip().split("\t")
word_count[word] += int(count)
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for word, count in word_count.items():
print(f"{word}\t{count}") # Emit final word count
sh
3. Scalability 📈
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Easily scales horizontally by adding more nodes to the cluster.
Works with commodity hardware, reducing costs.
8. Cost-Effective 💰
Runs on low-cost commodity hardware instead of expensive enterprise servers.
Open-source and widely adopted.
Help in choosing the right Big Data technologies (Hadoop, Spark, NoSQL).
Define data storage and processing strategies.
Guide business decisions and AI/ML model development.
Would you like to explore tools for handling Big Data efficiently? 🚀
what is etl
What is ETL? 🔄📊
ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) is a data integration process used to collect data from multiple
sources, clean and transform it, and load it into a data warehouse, database, or analytics system.
Data Type Operational Data (real-time) Aggregated Data (processed for analysis)
Data Processing OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) OLAP (Online Analytical Processing)
Data Structure Normalized (Relational Schema) Denormalized (Star or Snowflake Schema)
CRUD operations (Create, Read, Update,
Usage Business Intelligence (BI), reporting, and analytics
Delete)
Speed Optimized for fast transactions Optimized for complex queries
Bank account transactions, e-commerce
Example Sales reports, trend analysis, decision-making
orders
Storage Stores only recent data Stores historical data (years of data)
Examples of Amazon Redshift, Google BigQuery, Snowflake,
MySQL, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Oracle
Tools Apache Hive
Key Takeaways
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✅ Databases handle real-time transactions (e.g., user registrations, purchases).
✅ Data Warehouses store historical data for analysis (e.g., company performance trends).
✅ ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) is often used to move data from a database to a warehouse.
Would you like an example of how to migrate data from a database to a warehouse? 😊
give some questions asked in data engineer interview an give anwers as well only ask questiosn that
i have mentioned above the chat
👉 Answer:
Data Engineering is the process of designing, building, and managing data pipelines that enable
organizations to collect, store, and process large volumes of data efficiently. It involves working with ETL
pipelines, databases, data warehouses, big data technologies (Hadoop, Spark), and cloud
platforms to ensure data is reliable and available for analytics and machine learning.
👉 Answer:
Data Modeling is the process of structuring and organizing data in a way that ensures efficient storage,
retrieval, and processing. It defines how data is related and stored within a database or data warehouse.
Common data models include:
3. What are the different types of Data Schemas used in Data Modeling?
👉 Answer:
There are three main types of schemas:
👉 Answer:
Feature Structured Data 📊 Unstructured Data 🖼️
Definition Data organized in tables with a fixed schema Data with no predefined format
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Feature Structured Data 📊 Unstructured Data 🖼️
Storage Relational Databases (MySQL, PostgreSQL) NoSQL, Data Lakes, Cloud Storage
Examples SQL Tables, Spreadsheets Images, Videos, Social Media Posts
5. What is Hadoop?
👉 Answer:
Hadoop is an open-source framework for storing and processing large datasets in a distributed
computing environment. It consists of:
HDFS (Hadoop Distributed File System) – Stores large files across multiple machines.
MapReduce – Processes data in parallel using distributed computing.
YARN (Yet Another Resource Negotiator) – Manages cluster resources.
Hadoop Ecosystem – Includes tools like Hive, HBase, Spark, and Flink.
👉 Answer:
The NameNode is the master node in HDFS responsible for managing metadata, file system
namespace, and block locations. It does not store actual data but keeps track of which DataNode stores
which block of a file.
💡 Key Features:
Stores metadata (fsimage, edit logs).
Manages file-to-block mapping.
Monitors DataNodes via heartbeats.
Supports High Availability with Active/Standby NameNodes.
👉 Answer:
Hadoop Streaming is a utility that allows running MapReduce jobs using any programming language
(e.g., Python, Bash, Perl). It enables non-Java developers to write mapper and reducer functions.
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👉 Answer:
✅ Distributed Storage (HDFS) – Stores large data across nodes.
✅ Fault Tolerance – Data replication ensures reliability.
✅ Scalability – Easily add more nodes.
✅ Parallel Processing (MapReduce) – Speeds up computations.
✅ YARN (Resource Management) – Efficient workload scheduling.
✅ Works with Big Data Ecosystem – Supports Hive, Spark, Flink, Kafka.
9. What are the 4 Vs of Big Data?
👉 Answer:
1. Volume – Massive amounts of data (terabytes, petabytes).
2. Velocity – High speed of data generation (real-time analytics).
3. Variety – Different types of data (structured, semi-structured, unstructured).
4. Veracity – Ensuring data accuracy and trustworthiness.
👉 Answer:
ETL is a data integration process used to extract data from multiple sources, transform it into a usable
format, and load it into a database or data warehouse.
💡 Steps:
Extract – Retrieve data from databases, APIs, files.
Transform – Clean, filter, and format data.
Load – Store in a data warehouse (e.g., Amazon Redshift, Snowflake).
👉 Answer:
Feature Database 🗃️ Data Warehouse 🏢
Purpose Stores transactional data Stores analytical data
Processing Type OLTP (Online Transaction Processing) OLAP (Online Analytical Processing)
Data Structure Normalized (Relational) Denormalized (Star, Snowflake Schema)
Usage CRUD operations (insert, update, delete) Business Intelligence, Reporting
💡 Would you like me to generate a Python-based ETL pipeline example or a sample SQL query for
data transformation? 😊
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sorry i meant apart from questosn i asked you
No problem! Here are some additional Data Engineering interview questions that go beyond what
we've discussed:
👉 Answer:
Feature Hadoop MapReduce Apache Spark
Processing Batch processing (disk-based) In-memory & batch processing
Fault Tolerance Uses replication Uses DAG & RDD for fault tolerance
👉 Answer:
Data partitioning is the process of dividing a database table into smaller, more manageable pieces to
improve performance and query efficiency.
Types of Partitioning:
1. Range Partitioning – Based on value ranges (e.g., sales data by year).
2. Hash Partitioning – Uses a hash function to distribute data evenly.
3. List Partitioning – Based on predefined lists (e.g., region-based data).
4. Composite Partitioning – Combines multiple partitioning strategies.
👉 Answer:
A Slowly Changing Dimension (SCD) is a dimension that changes over time but not frequently.
Types of SCDs:
1. Type 1 (Overwrite Data) – No history maintained, old data is replaced.
2. Type 2 (Add New Row) – Maintains history by adding a new row with timestamps.
3. Type 3 (Add New Column) – Stores the previous value in an additional column.
📌 Example:
Customer address change → Type 1: Overwrites old address.
Employee salary change → Type 2: Adds a new row with new salary.
👉 Answer:
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Feature Data Warehouse 🏢 Data Lake 🌊
Data Type Structured All types (structured, semi-structured, unstructured)
Storage Format Relational Tables Raw format (JSON, Parquet, ORC)
Processing Batch Processing (OLAP) Real-time & batch (AI, ML, Analytics)
Cost Expensive (due to structured storage) Cheaper (stores raw data)
Use Case Business Intelligence, Reporting Data Science, Big Data Analytics
Examples Amazon Redshift, Snowflake AWS S3, Azure Data Lake, Google Cloud Storage
👉 Answer:
Schema Evolution is the ability to adapt and modify schemas over time in a Data Lake without
affecting existing data.
Tools that support Schema Evolution: Apache Avro, Apache Parquet, Delta Lake.
Example Scenario:
Initially, a dataset has Name & Age fields.
Later, a new field Email is added.
Schema evolution ensures old data is not lost while allowing new data format.
👉 Answer:
The CAP Theorem states that a distributed system can only achieve two out of three properties:
📌 Examples:
CP System (Consistency + Partition Tolerance) → MongoDB, HBase
AP System (Availability + Partition Tolerance) → Cassandra, DynamoDB
👉 Answer:
1. Key-Value Stores – Redis, DynamoDB (fast lookups).
2. Document Stores – MongoDB, CouchDB (JSON-like documents).
3. Column-Family Stores – Apache Cassandra, HBase (scalable).
4. Graph Databases – Neo4j (for relationships, social networks).
👉 Answer:
An idempotent operation produces the same result even if executed multiple times.
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Example:
Non-idempotent: `INSERT INTO users (id, name) VALUES (1, 'John');`
Running twice duplicates the record.
Idempotent: `UPDATE users SET name = 'John' WHERE id = 1;`
Running twice does not change the outcome.
📌 Why is it important? In ETL and Data Pipelines, idempotency prevents duplicate data processing.
9. What are the different file formats used in Big Data?
👉 Answer:
1. CSV – Simple, but inefficient for large data.
2. JSON – Flexible, used for APIs and logs.
3. Avro – Supports schema evolution, compact.
4. Parquet – Columnar format, optimized for analytics.
5. ORC – Similar to Parquet, but optimized for Hive.
📌 Parquet and ORC are preferred for Big Data because of compression and fast reads.
10. How do you handle Duplicate Records in a Data Pipeline?
👉 Answer:
✅ Use Primary Keys or Unique Constraints – Ensures uniqueness at the database level.
✅ Deduplication in ETL – Remove duplicates using SQL ( , ).
✅ Streaming Deduplication – Apache Kafka Streams or Apache Flink windowing functions.
`DISTINCT` `ROW_NUMBER()`
These are some advanced Data Engineering interview questions that go beyond the basics. Let me
know if you need deeper explanations, code examples, or a mock interview session! 😊🚀
more
Here are more advanced Data Engineering interview questions with answers! 🚀
11. What is the Difference Between Batch Processing and Stream Processing?
👉 Answer:
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Feature Batch Processing 🗂️ Stream Processing 🚀
Data Handling Processes large datasets in chunks Processes data in real time
Latency Higher (minutes, hours) Low (milliseconds, seconds)
📌 Example:
A company runs an ETL job every night to update sales reports (Batch Processing).
A bank monitors fraudulent transactions in real-time (Stream Processing).
👉 Answer:
A watermark is a mechanism in stream processing that tracks event time progress and ensures late-
arriving data is handled correctly.
📌 Example Scenario:
A Kafka stream processes real-time sensor data.
Events may arrive late due to network delays.
A watermark ensures the system waits for late data up to a specific threshold before finalizing
computations.
👉 Answer:
Change Data Capture (CDC) is a technique for detecting and capturing changes in a database (inserts,
updates, deletes) and propagating them to downstream systems.
✅ Types of CDC:
Log-Based CDC – Reads database logs (Debezium, Oracle GoldenGate).
Trigger-Based CDC – Uses database triggers (performance overhead).
Query-Based CDC – Periodic polling (not real-time).
📌 Use Case:
A retail company uses CDC to sync customer orders from MySQL to a Data Warehouse in real-time.
👉 Answer:
A Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) in Apache Airflow is a workflow representation that defines task
dependencies.
💡 Key Features:
Directed – Tasks have dependencies (e.g., Task A → Task B).
Acyclic – No circular dependencies allowed.
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Graph – Represents data flow between tasks.
def my_task():
print("Hello, Airflow!")
task = PythonOperator(
task_id='print_task',
python_callable=my_task,
dag=dag
)
👉 Answer:
A data orchestration tool automates and manages data workflows.
✅ Popular Tools:
Apache Airflow – Best for workflow scheduling.
Prefect – Similar to Airflow, but easier to use.
Dagster – Data-aware orchestration.
Luigi – Developed by Spotify for ETL.
👉 Answer:
Sharding is a method of splitting a large database into smaller, more manageable parts called shards,
each stored on a different server.
✅ Types of Sharding:
1. Range-Based Sharding – Splits data based on a range (e.g., user IDs 1–1000 in one shard).
2. Hash-Based Sharding – Uses a hash function to distribute data evenly.
3. Geographical Sharding – Stores data in regional clusters (e.g., US users in US database).
📌 Use Case:
A social media app shards user data to distribute traffic and improve performance.
👉 Answer:
Data Skew occurs when some partitions have significantly more data than others, causing slow
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execution.
✅ Ways to Fix Data Skew:
1. Salting Technique – Introduce random keys to distribute data evenly.
2. Repartitioning – Increase the number of partitions.
3. Broadcast Join – Use `broadcast()` for small tables.
df_large = spark.read.parquet("large_table")
df_small = spark.read.parquet("small_table")
👉 Answer:
Feature Vertical Scaling (Scale Up) 🏗️ Horizontal Scaling (Scale Out) 🚀
Method Increase CPU, RAM, storage Add more machines
Performance Limited by hardware Scales infinitely
📌 Use Case:
MySQL Database → Vertical Scaling (more CPU/RAM).
MongoDB Cluster → Horizontal Scaling (more servers).
👉 Answer:
A Lakehouse is a hybrid data architecture that combines the benefits of Data Lakes and Data
Warehouses.
✅ Features:
ACID Transactions (like a Data Warehouse).
Stores raw + processed data (like a Data Lake).
Supports SQL & ML (Apache Iceberg, Delta Lake).
👉 Answer:
✅ Increase Parallelism – Use multi-threading or distributed computing (Apache Spark).
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✅ Optimize SQL Queries – Indexing, partitioning, and avoiding SELECT *.
✅ Use Columnar Storage Formats – Parquet or ORC for analytics.
✅ Incremental Loading – Only process new data instead of full loads.
✅ Compression & Caching – Reduce data transfer time.
📌 Example: Instead of processing all rows daily, an ETL pipeline only loads new data (incremental
ETL).
21. What is the Difference Between Data Replication and Data Mirroring?
👉 Answer:
Feature Data Replication 🔄 Data Mirroring 🪞
Definition Copies data across multiple locations Maintains an exact copy of data
Use Case Disaster recovery, load balancing High availability, backup
Delta Lake is different from a traditional Data Lake because it adds reliability, ACID transactions, and
performance optimizations on top of a standard Data Lake. Let’s break it down:
Streaming Support
❌ Batch-oriented, streaming is ✅ Native support for real-time streaming with
complex `Append Mode`
Governance &
❌ Risk of data corruption ✅ Strong governance with Delta Logs &
Reliability Schema Evolution
df.write.format("parquet").save("/data/sales")
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python
df.write.format("delta").mode("overwrite").save("/delta/sales")
spark.read.format("delta").option("versionAsOf", 5).load("/delta/sales")
deltaTable.update(
condition="customer_id = 123",
set={"amount": "amount * 1.1"} # Increase amount by 10%
)
✅ 2. Completeness Check
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Identifies null or missing values.
Example: Finding that 20% of rows in the `email` column are missing.
✅ 4. Statistical Analysis
Calculates mean, median, mode, standard deviation to find outliers.
Example: Detecting a salary value of ₹1,000,000,000 in an employee dataset.
import pandas as pd
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# Check duplicates
print(df.duplicated().sum())
💡 TL;DR: Data Profiling helps detect missing, incorrect, or inconsistent data to improve data quality
before using it in analytics, ETL, or AI models. 🚀
Compression
✅ High (Snappy, Gzip, ❌ Low ❌ Low ✅ Medium
Zstd)
Query Performance
✅ Fast (Reads only ❌ Slow (Reads ❌ Slow (Nested ✅ Faster than
required columns) full rows) parsing) CSV/JSON
Schema Evolution ✅ Supports ❌ No ❌ No ✅ Supports
Splittable (Parallel
Processing)
✅ Yes ❌ No ❌ No ✅ Yes
Metadata Support ✅ Stores schema & stats ❌ No ❌ No ✅ Yes
Big Data Analytics, Data Logs, Simple Streaming,
Best Use Case API Responses
Warehousing Tables Serialization
import pandas as pd
# Sample DataFrame
data = {'id': [1, 2, 3], 'name': ['Alice', 'Bob', 'Charlie'], 'salary': [50000, 60000, 70000]}
df = pd.DataFrame(data)
# Save as Parquet
df.to_parquet("employees.parquet", engine="pyarrow", compression="snappy")