Design Date-Range File Storage

1. Problem Statement

2. Architecture Discussion Map

Use this as one discussion aid, not a single correct answer. Your design should follow from the requirements, scale, and trade-offs you establish.

graph LR
    A["Design Date-Range File Storage"]
    A --> F1["File metadata and timestamp semantics"]
    A --> F2["Range-query index design"]
    A --> F3["Time partitioning and hot partitions"]
    A --> F4["Blob storage lifecycle"]
    A --> F5["Consistency, pagination, and backfills"]

3. Key Focus Areas

• 1
  File metadata and timestamp semantics
• 2
  Range-query index design
• 3
  Time partitioning and hot partitions
• 4
  Blob storage lifecycle
• 5
  Consistency, pagination, and backfills

4. What the Interviewer Looks For

The interviewer probes these areas, and the report grades the interview against them.

• Timestamp and API semantics
• Metadata index and partitioning
• Exactness under concurrent writes and corrections
• Blob storage lifecycle and capacity
• Reliability, caching, and operations

5. What Strong Candidates Should Demonstrate

• Define timestamp semantics and exact inclusive/exclusive boundaries.
• Separate blob storage from metadata indexing.
• Partition range indexes without returning files outside the interval.