Hiring a software engineer for your company isn’t an easy task, as it requires a lot of effort. Not only candidates but also the interviewer, need to have some software knowledge. But, it is possible that you may not have that much knowledge to hire a software engineer. That’s the reason we are here. In this article, we will tell you about the technical skills for software engineer that you must test while hiring a software engineer.

Technical Skills for Software Engineer

Here are skills that you can test before hiring any software engineer:

1. Cloud computing skills

They must have knowledge of cloud computing for Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, and Azure. This is very important because when a business makes a shift to cloud-based servers, it makes their business more efficient and scalable. Knowing cloud computing skills gives the candidates a plus because it is also essential for AI and machine learning, including data science.

2. Data structure and algorithms

Both of these things are crucial in terms of the software development process. The candidate you are interviewing needs to have data structure and algorithm knowledge because it allows him to organize data. Additionally, it also helps software engineers keep their code clean and create problem-specific software, including optimizing products to give the best user experience.

3. Git and GitHub

Having knowledge of Git and GitHub is very crucial as it are the go-tos for web developers, software engineers, etc. So, it is a very crucial skill that your candidate must have. 

This is because Git and GitHub allow and provide source control, also known as version control for software development. Moreover, it helps software engineers to roll back any changes that they have made to a previous state (only if the current version has some glitch or bugs).

4. Programming languages 

You must also check how many programming languages the candidates know. It is essential to know whether they know C++, Python, and Javascript. This is because these languages are used to create software packages. 

Moreover, the ideal candidate also has some knowledge of HTML and CSS because these are used to create websites. Nonetheless, if you are ATS hiring a software engineer mainly to create web-based applications, they must know the Ruby programming language. So, these are some programming languages that an ideal candidate must know, depending on your company’s needs.

5. Containers (Docker and Kubernetes)

Containers like Kubernetes or Docker allow the engineer to simplify the deployment process. Moreover, it also allows engineers to test the apps that they have made in a unified environment.

6. Operating systems

You must organize a software engineer skills test to check how many operating systems they are used to. It is crucial knowledge for software engineers to understand. With the help of this test, you can know if the candidate knows how operating systems work so that they can create applications or software for those specific OSs.

7. Text editors

Try to find out if they know how to use text editing tools like Notepad or VIM on Windows and Linux, respectively. Some additional text editors are also there, like Notepad++ and Sublime. These editors provide IDE-like functionalities.

8. Databases

A good software engineer must have excellent knowledge of databases, as this is the most crucial aspect of app development. Yes, if your software engineer knows how to create, update, store, modify, and insert records using MySQL, SQL, Microsoft SQL Server, etc., then the process becomes very easy. 

9. Linux

As far as I know, almost every programmer in the world uses UNIX machines, such as Linux servers. Therefore, it is very crucial to check whether the candidate you are interviewing has knowledge about the Linux command line. Using this, they can easily search files, do advanced tasks, and perform some basic checks on the system’s CPU and memory usage.

10. Testing

The testing phase is crucial and equally important to creating a software program. Yes, just creating the software program isn’t enough, the developer needs to test it for bugs and some other vulnerabilities before launching it. So, an ideal software engineer needs to test the software. To do this, they need to be knowledgeable about various testing frameworks for various programming languages.

11. Computer networking

Check if they have basic computer networking knowledge. This helps them make the application easy to use for clients and servers. As a software engineer, they need to have basic knowledge to develop and support their applications. So, that’s all we have for you on what you should test while hiring a software engineer. We hope that you find this article helpful. For more information, comment below.