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LaTeX & Typst (papers, theses, resumes and slides) Module 9

Resumes, CVs and letters interview questions

Interview questions on resumes, CVs and letters: short warm-ups, then what each harder question tests, the first step of a good answer and its follow-ups.

9 questions: 3 warm-ups and 6 with model answers · Levels: Fresher to senior

Warm-up questions

Short questions with short answers, each answered in full.

Fresher to mid

Why can a resume PDF look right and still read wrongly as text?

Answered in the lesson A one-page resume in LaTeX that parses
Fresher to mid

Why keep a resume's facts in a YAML or JSON file instead of in the Typst source?

Answered in the lesson A resume in Typst, generated from data
Fresher to mid

How does biblatex print only the journal articles of a CV's .bib file, under a heading of their own?

Answered in the lesson Academic CVs, cover letters and a shared style

Questions with model answers

What each question tests, the first step of a good answer and the follow-ups to expect.

Fresher to mid

A LaTeX resume made from a downloaded template looks complete, but the form a job portal fills from the PDF has no e-mail address, a heading joined to the phone number, and the dates of two jobs under the wrong employer. Find the causes from the PDF and fix the source without changing its look more than you must.
What it tests

Reading a PDF the way software does, tracing each symptom to one habit of the template, and fixing the template's macros rather than its lines one by one.

First step

Read the PDF, not the source. Extract its text with two or three extractors, list its link targets with pdfinfo -url, and mark each place where the text differs from the page. Each symptom then points at a habit of the template: an icon before the address, a heading macro without \par, fields pushed right with \hfill.
Follow-ups
- The address is visible on the page but absent from every extractor's text. What else can hide it?
- How do you prove the fix works before you apply again?
- The template is shared by a whole class of students. Where do you fix it?
From the lesson A one-page resume in LaTeX that parses
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In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
Mid to senior

An employer asks every applicant for a tagged, accessible PDF. Your LaTeX resume is built with pdfLaTeX and uses titlesec headings, a rule under each heading and Font Awesome icons. Plan the changes, and the checks that prove its headings, reading order and links are right.
What it tests

Knowing what LaTeX's tagging supports today, why a validator's pass is not proof of structure, and which checks of the structure tree and the text show a tagged resume is usable.

First step

Switch tagging on before you redesign anything, and see what breaks: add \DocumentMetadata with lang, pdfstandard and tagging=on, build, run veraPDF, and count the H1 headings in pdfinfo -struct-text. The count, not the validator, shows whether the titlesec headings survived.
Follow-ups
- veraPDF passes, but the structure tree has no headings. What do you change?
- The build must stay on pdfLaTeX. What else needs fixing?
- How do you check the reading order a screen reader will follow?
From the lesson A one-page resume in LaTeX that parses
Model answer, Pro.
In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
Fresher to mid

Four role variants of a resume are built with Typst from one YAML file. After a teammate adds three projects to the data, the data-science variant stops with an assertion that it runs over one page, while the other three still pass. Find the cause and fix it without editing each variant by hand.
What it tests

Reasoning about which items each variant keeps, measuring what a change of data adds to each, and fixing it in the roles of the data rather than in the template or the font size.

First step

List what the failing variant keeps before and after the change, with typst eval and the same rule the template uses, and compare it with a variant that passes. The new projects either name no roles, so every variant gets them, or carry points that only this variant keeps.
Follow-ups
- How do you see how far over one page the variant runs?
- Should the template shrink the font for that one variant?
- How do you stop the same thing happening after the next change?
From the lesson A resume in Typst, generated from data
Model answer, Pro.
In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
Mid to senior

Your team builds every variant of its resumes with Typst in continuous integration. Make the pipeline guarantee that each PDF is tagged, titled, one page long and passes PDF/UA-1, and say what each check catches that the others miss.
What it tests

Knowing what PDF/UA-1 export checks during the compile, what veraPDF checks afterwards, and what only the template's own asserts or a reading of the extracted text can catch.

First step

Sort the checks by when they run. The template's asserts and --pdf-standard ua-1 run inside typst compile and stop a bad build; veraPDF and the extracted text run on the finished PDF. Then name one failure from this lesson that only each layer catches.
Follow-ups
- veraPDF and ua-1 both pass, but one variant lost a section. Which check would have caught it?
- How do you keep a PDF from changing without a change to its sources?
- A colleague wants to drop ua-1 to make the build faster. What do you answer?
From the lesson A resume in Typst, generated from data
Model answer, Pro.
In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
Mid to senior

A researcher's CV exists as a word-processor file and a LaTeX file, each with about 40 hand-typed references, and the two now disagree on page ranges and titles. Design one source that groups the works by type, marks a few for a short resume, builds in LaTeX and Typst, and stays right as works are added.
What it tests

Treating publications as data with types and keywords, choosing the filters of each system, and checking the output against the data rather than by eye.

First step

Make a .bib file the one source before choosing any layout: one entry per work, with the right entry type, sentence-case titles with braced proper nouns, a DOI where there is one, and keywords for what each work is for. Then reconcile both old lists against it, entry by entry, and record each disagreement you settle.
Follow-ups
- The word-processor file must still exist for a funding portal. How do you keep it in step?
- Co-authors spell the researcher's name in two ways. What do you store?
- How do you prove that no work was lost in the move?
From the lesson Academic CVs, cover letters and a shared style
Model answer, Pro.
In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes
Fresher to mid

Your resume, CV and cover letter each carry their own copy of the margins, fonts and heading style, and after a year of edits they no longer match. Restructure them around one shared style, and show how you check that the three PDFs really match.
What it tests

Separating look from content, making every document use one style file or module, and checking the match from the PDFs rather than by eye.

First step

List what each document sets itself: page size and margins, fonts and sizes, the heading style, and the header with the name and contact line. Everything that must be the same moves into one style file or module, and each document keeps only its own content.
Follow-ups
- One document must use another class or template. What can it still share?
- How do you stop a new document from leaving the style out?
- What does a check of the fonts miss?
From the lesson Academic CVs, cover letters and a shared style
Model answer, Pro.
In the answer:
- Model answer
- Follow-up answers
- Common mistakes
- Rubric
- Variants
- about 3 minutes

All LaTeX & Typst (papers, theses, resumes and slides) interview questions · The LaTeX & Typst (papers, theses, resumes and slides) track

Warm-up questions

Why can a resume PDF look right and still read wrongly as text?

Why keep a resume's facts in a YAML or JSON file instead of in the Typst source?

How does biblatex print only the journal articles of a CV's .bib file, under a heading of their own?

Questions with model answers

An employer asks every applicant for a tagged, accessible PDF. Your LaTeX resume is built with pdfLaTeX and uses titlesec headings, a rule under each heading and Font Awesome icons. Plan the changes, and the checks that prove its headings, reading order and links are right.

Four role variants of a resume are built with Typst from one YAML file. After a teammate adds three projects to the data, the data-science variant stops with an assertion that it runs over one page, while the other three still pass. Find the cause and fix it without editing each variant by hand.

Your team builds every variant of its resumes with Typst in continuous integration. Make the pipeline guarantee that each PDF is tagged, titled, one page long and passes PDF/UA-1, and say what each check catches that the others miss.

Your resume, CV and cover letter each carry their own copy of the margins, fonts and heading style, and after a year of edits they no longer match. Restructure them around one shared style, and show how you check that the three PDFs really match.