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Design a job queue for long-running LLM tasks, priorities, cancellation, progress, and poison messages.

A 'simple' queue question with four traps wired in: minutes-long tasks break every default timeout, cancellation has to actually stop spend, progress needs a contract, and one bad job must never wedge the lane.

Updated Aug 2026 · Grounded in real Forward Deployed Engineer interview loops and written to a senior-engineer editorial bar.

A 'simple' queue question with four traps wired in: minutes-long tasks break every default timeout, cancellation has to actually stop spend, progress needs a contract, and one bad job must never wedge the lane.

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