SQL interview questions are an interesting counterpoint to stereotypical programming interviews: while typical algo questions in SWE interviews tend to test what's taught in academic contexts but have little real-world application; the questions in SQL interviews are more practical outside the whiteboard.

A weakness of these types of SQL questions however is that it's near impossible for the interviewer to provide help/guidance; the questions are often know-it-or-don't questions (especially involving window functions w/ uncommon syntax). A data science interviewer years ago mocked me during a whiteboard test for not knowing the BETWEEN ROW syntax for a window function.

That said, as an IRL data scientist, the amount of times I've had to do a SQL self-join in the past few years can be counted on one hand. And the BETWEEN ROW syntax for a window function.