66. An 8-Week Study Plan
Assumes ~8–10 hours/week. Adjust to your starting point.
| Week | Focus | Do |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Foundations (Parts 0–I) | §1–8. Memorize the numbers in §3.1. Do 5 estimation drills (Twitter, YouTube, WhatsApp, Uber, Google Search). |
| 2 | Data | §9–10, §6.3, §18. Read DDIA chapters 5–7 (replication, partitioning, transactions). Explain quorums and isolation levels out loud. Model one domain three ways (§18). |
| 3 | Async & reliability | §11–17. Implement a toy outbox + idempotent consumer, or a token bucket, in Go. Read the Builders' Library on timeouts, retries, and jitter. |
| 4 | Cases (beginner/intermediate) | §31–35. Each one timed at 45 minutes, out loud, recorded. Then compare against the solution. Start the §63.10 drawing drills (10 min/day). |
| 5 | Advanced (Part III) | §19–24. Read the Raft paper, Spanner, Dynamo, The Tail at Scale, and the metastable failures paper. |
| 6 | Cases (advanced) | §36–41. Do at least two mock interviews with peers. Ask for feedback on the four signals (§1.2). |
| 7 | Expert layer (Part IV) + AI | §27–30, §25–26, §60. Write a 2-page design doc for one case, with alternatives, cost, a migration plan, and a risk register. Prepare 3 stories about real systems you led (situation, decision, trade-offs, measurable outcome). |
| 8 | Polish (Part VII) | §42–46, §61–65. Two full mocks per week, targeted at your company. Review red flags. Rest before the loop. |
Adjusting the plan to your role:
- Senior: weeks 1–4 and 6 matter most. Spend week 5 on §18 (data modeling) and week 7 on §64 (past-project deep dive) instead of Part IV.
- Staff / Principal: follow the plan as written, add Appendix A in week 5, and push the deep dives in every mock to the internals level.
- EM / Sr. EM: merge weeks 2–3, and use the freed week for §30, the EM rows of §60, and §64.7. Keep drawing full architectures; EMs who can't are a common rejection.
- Adjacent tracks: swap in the sections listed for your track in §60.3.
Practice protocol for every case:
- Set a 45-minute timer and talk out loud (or with a partner).
- Draw on a blank canvas in the tool the company uses (Excalidraw, Google Drawings, a whiteboard).
- Afterward: what did I miss in requirements? Which deep dive did I avoid? Did I mention cost, migration, and ownership?
- Redo the same case one week later in 35 minutes.
Where Part VI fits: from week 4 onward, do one Part VI walkthrough per week as a full mock. Read only the prompt, run it yourself, then compare step by step. Use the §67 prompt bank to pick targeted practice for your company (for example infrastructure prompts for platform roles, or multi-tenant SaaS prompts for Microsoft and Google Cloud).