Top Splunk Interview Questions to Help You Get the Job

Splunk is a software platform that helps businesses improve their IT infrastructure. It aids in the search, analysis, and visualization of machine-generated data collected from various sources such as websites, applications, sensors, and devices.

Cracking Splunk Interview Questions can be difficult, especially if you are unfamiliar with how to prepare for such interviews. Splunk Interview Questions may differ depending on whether you are a fresher or experienced professional. Let’s look at the article to understand the type of interview questions you can expect.

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In this article, we will look at some commonly asked Splunk Interview Questions. Here’s what we will cover in this guide:

• Splunk Interview Questions and Answers for Freshers
• Splunk Interview Questions and Answers for Experienced Developers
• Splunk Coding Interview Questions
• Common Interview Questions on Splunk
• FAQs on Splunk Interview Questions

Splunk Interview Questions and Answers for Freshers

Q1. Can you enlist some of the features that are lagging in Splunkfree?

These features are missing:

• Authentication as well as scheduled searches or alerts.
• Distributed search.
• Forwarding in TCP as well as HTTP to non-Splunk.
• Deployment management.

Q2. What is the function of Alert Manager?

It adds workflow to Splunk and provides a common app with dashboards to search for alerts or events.

Q3. What are the most important configuration files in Splunk?

They are:

• props.conf
• indexes.conf
• inputs.conf
• transforms.conf
• server.conf

Q4. How does Splunk work?

Forwarder acting like a dumb agent collects the data from the source. It then forwards it to the Indexer. The Indexer starts by storing the data locally in a host machine or the cloud. Then the Search Head is then used for searching, analyzing, and visualizing the data stored in the Indexer.

Q5. Name the three dashboards that are available in Splunk.

These are:

• Real-time dashboards
• Dynamic form-based dashboards
• Dashboards for scheduled reports

Q6. Define crontab.

The crontab has the commands and scripts that can be run on each server. Using it, you can run one command every hour and another one only once a week.

Q7. What are the different types of Splunk licenses?

The different types include:

• enterprise license
• Free license
• Forwarder license
• Beta license
• Licenses for search heads
• Licenses for cluster members

Q8. What is the use of a bucket in Splunk?

An index directory is called a bucket which moves through various stages once it ages.

Q9. What are the key features of the Splunk tool?

Here’s a snapshot of the key features:

• Indexing: Using the tool, you can collect data from devices and applications such as websites, servers, databases, and operating systems. The index segments of the tool can help you store, compress, and maintain the supporting metadata for accelerated searching.
• Alerts: Alerts notify you when search results for any real-time or historical searches meet the desired conditions. It is possible to configure alerts to trigger different actions, such as posting alert information to an RSS feed.
• Dashboards: The tool comes with panels of modules such as search boxes, fields, charts connected to saved searches or pivots. Completed search results and data from real-time searches are displayed here.
• Pivot: Pivot refers to the table, chart, or data visualization. You can create them with the help of the Pivot editor. You can also save individual Pivots as reports and add them to dashboards.

More Sample Splunk Interview Questions for Freshers

Here are some commonly asked Splunk Interview Questions you need if you are applying for entry-level positions:

1. What is Splunk?
2. What is a Splunk Forwarder? How many different types of Splunk Forwarders are there?
3. Explain how Splunk works.
4. What is a license violation in Splunk?
5. What are pivot and data models?
6. What are the differences between the Search Factor (SF) & Replication Factor (RF)?
7. What do you understand by file precedence in Splunk?
8. What is a summary index in Splunk?
9. What is the use of the eval command in Splunk?
10. Explain the different types of data inputs in Splunk.

Splunk Interview Questions and Answers for Experienced Developers

Listed below are common Splunk Interview Questions and Answers experienced developers may be asked:

Q1. Why should one use Spunk alerts?

Splunk alerts perform the same role as any other alerts -- you receive a notification triggered on any event. For example, the system will alert if the user enters the wrong credentials multiple times.

Q2. Describe the procedure to extract fields.

Fields can be extracted from event lists, sidebar, or the settings menu via the UI.

You can also write your own regular expressions in props.conf configuration file for extraction.

Q3. What is the difference between Splunk App and Splunk Add-on

While Splunk App is a collection of reports, dashboards, alerts, field extractions, and lookups, Splunk Add-ons provide the same information without any visual components or a dashboard.

Q4. How will you reset the Splunk admin password?

Log in to the server on which Splunk is installed, rename the passwd file at the below location, and then restart Splunk. When you restart your system, you can log in using the default username: admin password: changeme.

Q5. What is the difference between Search Head Pooling and Search Head Clustering?

Both are features provided by Splunk to ensure the high availability of Splunk search head if anyone search head goes down.

Search head cluster is a newly introduced feature and will replace the search head pooling in upcoming versions of Splunk.Search head cluster is managed by the captain, and the captain controls its slaves. Compared to search head pooling, search head cluster is more efficient.

Q6. Explain the process of assigning colors in a chart based on field names in Splunk UI?

You will need first to edit the panels built on top of a dashboard and then modify the panel settings from the UI. This will allow you to choose the colors. This is the preferred way as you can choose whatever colors you want and even assign different gradients and set your values into a radial gauge or water gauge.

Q7. What is the Mapreduce algorithm?

Mapreduce algorithm is typically used for batch-based large-scale parallelization, inspired by functional programming’s map() and reduce () functions.

More Sample Splunk Developer Interview Questions

Take a look at a few more Splunk Interview Questions for developers:

1. What are Splunk buckets?
2. Explain Splunk bucket lifecycle.
3. Define lookup command and its use case.
4. How do you reset Splunk Admin Password?
5. Explain Data Models and Pivot
6. Explain Search Factor (SF) & Replication Factor (RF)
7. Which commands are included in the ‘filtering results’ category?
8. Where is Splunk default configuration stored?
9. Name the features that are not part of Splunk Free?
10. How will you disable Splunk Launch Message?

Splunk Coding Interview Questions

Here are some of the most important Splunk Coding Interview Questions you can expect:

1. Define Splunk Indexer. What are the stages of Splunk Indexing?
2. What are the most important configuration files of Splunk?
3. Describe the different types of Splunk Licenses?
4. If the License Master is unreachable, what will you do?
5. What Is Splunk Db Connect?
6. Why do people prefer Splunk over other open-source options?
7. What are the common port numbers used by Splunk?
8. What are the components of Splunk?
9. Which is the current Splunk version in use?
10. Splunk SDK or Splunk Framework -- which one will you choose?

Common Interview Questions on Splunk

Take a look at frequently asked Splunk Interview Questions during the technical round:

1. How will you clear Splunk Search History?
2. Define Btool. How will you troubleshoot Splunk configuration files?
3. Explain the difference between Splunk App and Splunk Add-on.
4. What is Fishbucket?
5. What is Fishbucket Index?
6. How to set the default search time in Splunk 6?
7. What is Dispatch Directory?
8. How to reset Splunk Admin password?
9. How will you understand when Splunk has finished indexing a log file?
10. How do I proceed if I want to add folder access logs from a windows machine to Splunk?

FAQs on Splunk Interview Questions

Q1. Are there any rounds conducted before the actual interviews?

Based on our research, you may have a screening call and ask a few Splunk Interview Questions before moving to interview rounds with the hiring manager.

Q2. What type of Splunk Interview Questions can I expect during the behavioral interview?

Here are some common questions you may be asked during the behavioral round: Why do you want to join Splunk? What is your biggest weakness and strength? Tell us about a time you had to handle conflict at work.

Q3. How to prepare for Splunk interview questions?

Start with compiling a list of projects where you may have used the Splunk tool. These can be a great discussion point while answering Splunk interview questions. To crack the Splunk interview, make sure to practice the commonly asked Splunk interview questions, including coding challenges. Appearing for a few mock interviews and attending coding boot camps can also improve your chances of cracking the interview.

Q4. What topics should I prepare to ace Splunk interview questions?

You must focus on data structures, algorithms, SQL problems, amongst others, to breeze through challenging Splunk interview questions.

Q5. Are Splunk interview questions hard?

The Splunk interview process is fairly straightforward. Know fundamental concepts, and you shouldn’t find it difficult to ace them.

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