Previsor PHP assessment test

With more and more companies using pre-employment screening tests such as the one provided by Previsor, LAMP developers and PHP developers should hone their technical skills to prepare for their next career. Having taken one, the Previsor assessment test resembles College Board Tests such as the ACT and SAT, which tests students' general understanding of the subject (in this case "PHP"). PHP, especially version 5, is a great scripting language for developing web applications very rapidly with minimum effort. Since PHP is not really a university-level programming language, most of us familiar with the language picked up its grammar, syntax, and OOP'ness on our own whether experimental or work-related. Having to take the assessment test allows PHP developers to review the language semantics and grammar in a more academic fashion. However, judging a programmer's ability solely based on the assessment test score is "probably" not appropriate as most software engineers work with more than one programming language, and the time spent on one language may not correctly represent one's software engineering ability.

The test I have taken is comprised of 30 multiple choice questions, shown one question per page, and each question is allocated a maximum of 3 minutes with a time clock shown at the bottom of each question. Once you submit an answer, you're done with that question! There is no way to go back to a previous question. Out of 30 questions, about 75% of the questions were general PHP-related subjects and the remaining 25% were about PHP 5 and OOP. The test allows you to use online references which makes the test more realistic, as most of us look at search engines for function signatures and semantics when we need them.

To give you a feel for the type of questions being asked, I have searched my "Temporary Internet Files" folder and found more than a dozen code snippets used in the test. I do not recall exact questions but use the code snippets below to guess what's being asked.

1. I believe the question below is asking a line with an error.

2. This one is asking about a cookie, and what the code does with the cookie.

3. Once again, this one is asking about a syntax error.

4. The code below does what?

5. This question also asks what the code does.

6. What does this code do?

7. What do you have to replace *** with to do ...?

8. What do you have to replace *** with to print the colors in order?

9. How do you get the width of the image box (see line 7)?

10. What do you have to replace *** with to display options?

11. Which code allows you to display the fetched data in a table?

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

(e)

If you know of other questions being asked, please come back and add them to this list so that we have a running list of PHP assessment tests. Even if it's not the Previsor test question, if you know of a good question please pitch your two cents. Thank you for your participation.