This question evaluates system-design competencies such as data modeling for channels and direct messages, scalability and sharding, fanout and delivery strategies, consistency and ordering guarantees, indexing and query patterns for message history, and low-latency architecture for real-time messaging, and it belongs to the System Design domain.
Design a Slack-like messaging backend that supports:
Interview focus areas (expect deep follow-ups):
State your assumptions (scale, retention, consistency needs) and propose an end-to-end architecture.
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