Implement agent voting with average and sorting
Company: Atlassian
Role: Software Engineer
Category: Coding & Algorithms
Difficulty: medium
Interview Round: Onsite
Design an in-memory “agent voting” module that records ratings agents give to items (e.g., tickets/articles).
Requirements:
- Each vote is: `(agentId, itemId, rating)` where `rating` is an integer (e.g., 1–5).
- Support computing the **average rating** for a given `itemId`.
- Support returning items **sorted by average rating** (descending). Specify how ties are broken (e.g., by `itemId` ascending).
Clarify behaviors:
- If the same agent votes on the same item multiple times, should the latest vote replace the previous one?
- What should be returned for items with no votes?
Provide the core data structures and methods, and analyze time/space complexity.
Quick Answer: This question evaluates the ability to design in-memory data structures and algorithms for recording and aggregating agent votes, including computing average ratings, sorting by aggregate score with tie-breaking, handling update semantics for repeated votes, and accounting for items with no votes.