BackendDatabasesAround since 2001
Hibernate / JPA
Also written as Hibernate, JPA, Java Persistence API
JPA is a Java standard for mapping objects in code to rows in a database; Hibernate is the most widely used implementation of that standard (an ORM — object-relational mapper).
Think of it like
Like a translator standing between the application (which speaks 'objects') and the database (which speaks 'tables and rows') so neither side has to speak the other's language directly.
Junior or senior?
Junior sounds like
Uses Hibernate's defaults and trusts them.
Senior sounds like
Has hit and fixed an N+1 query problem, and can describe how they spotted it.
Ask them
“Have you run into the N+1 query problem with Hibernate? How did you spot it and fix it?”