Guest Post Interview Questions

Top 12 Splunk Interview Questions and Answers

Interview is one meeting that can change the future forever. It is this interaction that will decide whether you get the job that you have applied for or not. There are many individuals who are very talented but due to their confidence issues, they are not able to crack the job interviews.

If you are a professional who is skilled in Splunk and is looking for the interview session based on it then we have good news for you. Here, in this article, we have collated the most frequently asked questions to an experienced Splunk admin. Reading these questions will prepare you better for your upcoming interview on Splunk. We have also added the most suitable answers for these questions so that you don’t have to go around hunting for them. Let us start reading.

Splunk Interview Questions

Here, you can check the Splunk interview Questions for Security, Admin, and Architect. Below you can check the answers of these questions.  

  • What is Splunk?
  • What is a Splunk forwarder and what are types of Splunk forwarder?
  • What happens if the license master is unreachable?
  • What is a summary index in Splunk?
  • What is the difference between stats and eventstats commands?
  • What is btool or how will you troubleshoot Splunk configuration files?
  • What is the dispatch directory?
  • What is the difference between search head pooling and search head clustering?
  • How would you handle/troubleshoot Splunk license violation warning error?
  • What is MapReduce algorithm?
  • Explain how Splunk works.
  • Why use only Splunk? Why can’t I go for something that is open source?

Splunk Interview Questions and Answers

Here, you can check the Splunk interview questions and answers for different portfolio such as Splunk Security, Splunk Admin, Splunk Developer and architect.

Q1). What is Splunk?

Splunk is like Google for your machine information. It’s a product/Engine which can be utilized for seeking, imagining, Monitoring, reporting and so forth of your undertaking’s data. Plunk takes significant machine information and transforms it into incredible operational knowledge by giving real-time understanding to your data through outlines, cautions, reports and so forth.

Q2). What is a Splunk forwarder and what are types of Splunk forwarder?

In Splunk environment, there are two types of forwarder-

  • Universal forwarder (UF) – Splunk specialist introduced on a non-Splunk framework to assemble information locally, can’t parse or index information.
  • Heavyweight forwarder (HWF) – The full instance of Splunk with development usefulness by and large functions as a remote gatherer, halfway forwarder, and conceivable information channel since they parse information, they are not prescribed for creation frameworks

Q3). What happens if the license master is unreachable? 

License slave will begin a 24-hour clock, after which inquiry will be obstructed on the permit slave (however ordering proceeds). Clients won’t have the capacity to seek information in that slave until the point that it can achieve license master once more.

Q4). What is a summary index in Splunk?

The Summary list is the default outline list (the record that plunks Enterprise utilizes on the off chance that you don’t show another). In the event that you intend to run an assortment of outline record reports, you may need to make extra summary files.

Q5). What is the difference between stats and eventstats commands?

Stats create outline summary stats of every single existing field in your list items and save them as qualities in new fields. Eventstats is like the details direction, aggregate results are added inline to every event and just if the aggregation is relevant to that event, eventstats computes the asked for insights like details, yet totals them to the first original information.

Q6). What is btool or how will you troubleshoot Splunk configuration files?

Splunk btool is a direct line apparatus that encourages us to investigate design document issues or simply observe what values are being utilized by your Splunk Enterprise establishment in an existing condition.

Q7). What is the dispatch directory?

$SPLUNK_HOME/var/run/Splunk/dispatch contains an index for each hunt that is running or has finished. For instance, a registry named 1434308943.358 will contain a CSV record of its query items, a search.log with insights concerning the hunt execution, and other stuff. Utilizing the defaults (which you can abrogate in limits.conf), these indexes will be erased 10 minutes after the pursuit completes – except if the client spares the list items, in which case the outcomes will be erased following a 7 days’ time.

Q8). What is the difference between search head pooling and search head clustering?

Both are the features provided to Splunk to high accessibility of Splunk seek head when any one of the search head goes down. Search head bunch is recently presented and search head pooling will be expelled in next up and coming renditions. Search head bunch is overseen by skipper and commander controls its slaves. Search head group is more solid and proficient than search head pooling.

Q9). How would you handle/troubleshoot Splunk license violation warning error?

License infringement cautioning implies Splunk has ordered a bigger number of data batches than our purchase permit amount. We need to distinguish which list/source type has gotten more information recently than the expected everyday information volume. We can keep an eye on Splunk license master pool wise accessible quota and recognize the pool for which infringement is happening. When we know the pool for which we are accepting more information then we need to distinguish the top source type for which we are getting more information than the expected information amount. Once source type is recognized then we need to discover source machine which is sending an enormous number of logs and the main driver for the equivalent and investigate in the like manner.

Q10). What is MapReduce algorithm?

MapReduce calculation is the secret behind Splunk fast data searching speed. It’s a calculation regularly utilized for bunch based extensive scale parallelization. It’s motivated by practical programming’s map() and reduce() functions.

Q11). Explain how Splunk works.

This is a definite question in light of the fact that your questioner will pass judgment on this answer of yours to see how well you know the concept. The Forwarder acts like a dumb agent which will gather the information from the source and forward it to the Indexer. The Indexer will store the information locally in a host machine or on the cloud. The Search Head is then utilized for seeking, investigating, visualizing and performing different capacities on the information which is stored in the Indexer.

Q12). Why use only Splunk? Why can’t I go for something that is open source?

This sort of inquiry is solicited to comprehend the degree from your insight. You can answer that question by saying that Splunk has a ton of rivalry in the market for investigating machine logs, working together insight, for performing IT activities and giving security. Yet, there is no single device other than Splunk that can do these activities and that is the place Splunk where it makes all the difference and in the right way. With Splunk, you can without much of a stretch scale up your framework and get proficient help from an organization backing the stage. A portion of its rivals is Sumo Logic in the cloud space of log management and ELK in the open source class.

Conclusion

Splunk is an exceptional tool to take care of all the log management issues. This is the reason why many organizations are looking forward to hiring Splunk admins. It is the leading log management tool and that is why it is most important for you to get trained in it and also get certified in it to get good jobs.