Technical questions at interview

[steves85]

Hi guys,

Looking for some help on expected questions at an interview. Got one today about network shares. What would you do if a user rings up and says they can't access one of the network drives.

I haven't dealt a lot with troubleshooting network shares so my response was terrible. I said I'd ask the user what they were doing before it dropped out, when did they last access it, any errors received. Then I'd check permissions.

I knew it was a poor answer so what would be the correct response and action?

Also if there was a list of common questions that would help greatly.

 

[Oreo]

Hi guys,

Looking for some help on expected questions at an interview. Got one today about network shares. What would you do if a user rings up and says they can't access one of the network drives.

I haven't dealt a lot with troubleshooting network shares so my response was terrible. I said I'd ask the user what they were doing before it dropped out, when did they last access it, any errors received. Then I'd check permissions.

I knew it was a poor answer so what would be the correct response and action?

Also if there was a list of common questions that would help greatly.

1) Try Log the user off, and back on. Potentially several times.
2) If possible, re run the users log on script which maps the drives
3) If all else fails, manually map the drives for the time being and escalate the issue to a Senior to be looked at in more detail

 

[Yevrag35]

A lot of the times, rebooting the pc helps.

 

[iFargle]

Hi guys,

Looking for some help on expected questions at an interview. Got one today about network shares. What would you do if a user rings up and says they can't access one of the network drives.

I haven't dealt a lot with troubleshooting network shares so my response was terrible. I said I'd ask the user what they were doing before it dropped out, when did they last access it, any errors received. Then I'd check permissions.

I knew it was a poor answer so what would be the correct response and action?

Also if there was a list of common questions that would help greatly.

First I'd try to replicate the issue myself. If it's down on my side, I'd try another computer. If that's down, I'd let other admins know its down and let the user know it's down either site- or district-wide (I work in a school)

If it isn't down, I'd ask them if there is a specific error message they get when trying to access it.

If it isn't down, I'd ask them to log out / restart their computer and ask them if they have internet access. If that doesn't work, then I think my answer would be a bit different than most people. I like to personally handle things, so I'd say I'll be down in a minute to check it out myself. From there I will do a few things:

Open up Command Prompt and type in "NET USE" to see what path the network drive is pointing to. Then I'd try to manually access it (ie, without the shortcut)

If I CAN access it, I would remove the shortcut and re-add it. If I can't, I'd try to access it under another account (maybe if it deals with permissions)

Usually by that time it's fixed. If it isn't, there's probably another issue with it (ie proxies, malware, spyware, etc)

EDIT: And yes, from experience, a reboot will fix 95% of problems.

 

[ithanz]

Check the server which script and or drives are coming from, make sure it isn't down- . Ask if they receive errors, what error etc if that doesn't lead to anything specific get them to restart which will rerun the script or manually rerun the script if the script isn't loading with their log in which indicates a profile problem if everybody else is logging in fine with script running. If the script doesn't run automatically, run the script via command prompt, if that doesn't work, manually map the drives and depending on what your position is notify supervisor of the issue and state what the temp fix was. Sometimes the script might not be loading into their profile, profile is corrupt, profile hasn't been setup incorrectly etc etc so just restarting the persons comp may well just be a temp fix even though it looks like it is fixed and a supervisor should be notified.

That is assuming the maps are created via a script. Some small businesses just manually map the drive on individual computers so in this case all you would need to do is remap the drives if the server isn't down. Mine is more of a thin client/server based instructions which relies on a script.

 

[steves85]

Great thanks for all the answers. I was just a bit caught out on this one, but this will help me prepare for further interviews in the future.

 

[Lexluethar]

Not a whole lot to add, most people did a great job of explaining. I just wanted to add that all troubleshooting in IT, from the help desk to server admins is the same, start off large and narrow down the issue from there.

Lots of examples here, but just to show you how it works, take your example about the user accessing the network drive. Some things I would ask (again start large, then move to smaller and smaller possibilities).
1. Is the network location working on your PC (IE is this a company wide issue)
2. Are other network drives working (IE this could be their PC not hitting any network resources)

From those responses you narrow the problem down...

Okay so I can access those resources, so lets see if you can access other resources like printers, email, the internet. Simple ping commands can help here. Tracert can also show where you are losing packets. We have a large internal network, and sometimes users can access internal resources but not the internet. Tracert will show you where the packets are dropping (usually the ISP's router / hard wire).

Just like working with a PC, start off large and move to smaller possibilities. NEVER NEVER NEVER assume anything, just because they can't access a resource doen't mean they technically can't access it. Sometimes saying 'i can't access a network drive' means that they just don't have the desktop icon that the normally use to access those resources.

 

[steves85]

Thanks lex.

Had another interview and got questions about DNS, DHCP and Internet access. Was able to answer these comfortably and the interview went great.