For now, we mainly work with engineers for whom English the second or third language. Here are common mistakes we see among them, including real-world examples.
I. Easy
These mistakes are usually made due to a lack of attention to detail rather than a lack of knowledge. These mistakes are usually easy to catch and learn to prevent.
1.
Attention > Typos
"Leetcode" -> "LeetCode"
"Systems Design Primer" -> "System Design Primer"
2.
Attention > Singular vs plural
"3 LeetCode problem" -> "3 LeetCode problems"
3.
Attention > Spelling
"recomendations" -> "recommendations"
4.
Attention > Extra spacing
"Solve the Wild Card Matching problem" -> "Solve the Wild Card Matching problem"
II. Medium.
These mistakes usually point to a lack of knowledge of "medium complexity" rules in English.
1.
Grammar > Missing words
"Record a video and share on Telegram" -> "Record a video and share it on Telegram"
2.
Grammar > Tenses
"I founded one mistake" -> "I found one mistake"
3.
Grammar > Word order
"Read the Grokking the System Design 1 lecture" -> "Read 1 lecture of the Grokking the System Design" or "Read the Grokking the System Design (1 lecture)"
4.
Punctuation > Ending of a bullet point
Long phrases in bullet points don’t need a dot at the end, but if it’s a sentence without a bullet point use a dot.
5.
Punctuation > General separation
Some people write a list of phrases in their resume without using dashes or bullet points.
6.
Punctuation > Casing instead of quotes in titles
"Read 'Queue and BFS' chapter on LeetCode" -> "Read the Queue and BFS chapter on LeetCode"
II. Larger problems
These mistakes usually point to a lack of knowledge of complex rules in English.
1.
Grammar > Articles
"Solve problem Reverse Nodes in k-Group" -> "Solve the Reverse Nodes in the k-Group problem"
"Conduct interviewing.io coding interview" -> "Conduct an interviewing.io coding interview" or "Conduct one interviewing.io coding interview"
2.
Grammar > Prepositions
"Read through 3 chapters via the CCI book" -> "Read through 3 chapters of the CCI book"
3.
Casing > Capitalizing the first letter of bullet points
4.
Casing > Job titles
[Usage context: a job title in a resume] "software engineer" -> "Software Engineer"
[Usage context: a job title in a resume] "Senior Software engineer" -> "Senior Software Engineer"
In general, we strongly encourage using the most modern spell-checker. As of 2022-06-20, we believe the best is Grammarly.