CV0-004 Cloud Architecture and Design Practice Test 10 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A company is considering using a public cloud provider. Which TWO characteristics are typical of a public cloud deployment? (Select TWO.)

Accepted Answer

Resources are shared among multiple customers. A public cloud is characterized by multi-tenancy (resources shared among multiple customers) and pay-as-you-go pricing, where the customer pays only for the resources they use. Options C and D describe these typical characteristics. Option A is incorrect because the cloud provider manages the physical infrastructure, not the customer. Option B describes a private cloud, which is isolated to a single organization. Option E describes on-premises deployment, not public cloud.

Answer

The customer has full control over the physical infrastructure

Answer

The deployment is isolated to a single organization

Answer

Resources are hosted on-premises

Question 2

A company is designing an auto-scaling solution for a stateless application. Which TWO features are essential for the application to scale horizontally without issues? (Select TWO.)

Accepted Answer

Stateless application design. Horizontal scaling requires that the application is stateless, meaning no session data is stored locally on instances, so any instance can handle any request. A load balancer is essential to distribute incoming traffic across multiple instances, ensuring no single instance is overwhelmed and that requests can be sent to any available instance. In contrast, stateful session management (B) and local storage (C) would tie data to specific instances, preventing seamless scaling. Vertical scaling (D) is about increasing resources of existing instances, not adding more instances horizontally.

Answer

Stateful session management

Answer

Use of local storage for application data

Answer

Vertical scaling on the existing instances

Question 3

A company is designing a hybrid cloud storage solution. Which TWO storage services are suitable for a shared file system accessible from both on-premises and cloud VMs? (Select TWO.)

Accepted Answer

Azure Files. Azure Files (B) is correct because it provides fully managed SMB and NFS file shares that can be mounted simultaneously from on-premises Windows/Linux machines and Azure VMs, making it a true shared file system for hybrid scenarios. Amazon EFS (E) is correct because it is a managed NFS file system that supports mounting from on-premises servers via AWS Direct Connect or VPN as well as from EC2 instances in multiple Availability Zones. Azure Blob (A) is object storage accessed via HTTP/REST rather than a mountable shared file system, so it does not meet the requirement. Amazon S3 (C) is also object storage with a REST API, not a POSIX/NFS/SMB file system. Amazon EBS (D) provides block storage volumes attached to a single EC2 instance and cannot be shared across on-premises and cloud VMs.

Answer

Azure Blob

Answer

Amazon S3

Answer

Amazon EBS

Question 4

A company is using a PaaS offering to host a web application. Which THREE management responsibilities are retained by the customer? (Select THREE.)

Accepted Answer

Application code. In a PaaS model, the provider manages the platform stack (runtime, middleware, OS, virtualization), while the customer retains responsibility for what they deploy and control on top of it. Option B (Application code) is correct because the customer writes, deploys, and maintains the application itself, including its logic, dependencies, and updates. Option D (Data and its security) is correct because the customer owns the data, controls classification, encryption, backup, and access policies, even though the provider secures the underlying storage infrastructure. Option E (Access and identity management) is correct because the customer manages user accounts, roles, authentication, and authorization for their application and data, typically via the provider's IAM tooling or federation. Option A (Runtime environment) is not retained by the customer, as the PaaS provider manages the language runtime, libraries, and execution environment. Option C (Operating system patches) is not retained by the customer, since the provider handles OS-level patching and maintenance in a PaaS offering.

Answer

Runtime environment

Answer

Operating system patches

Question 5

A company wants to ensure fault tolerance for a critical application by deploying across multiple availability zones. Which THREE design decisions contribute to fault tolerance? (Select THREE.)

Accepted Answer

Placing a load balancer in front of the instances to distribute traffic. Deploying across multiple AZs, using load balancers to distribute traffic, and having redundant components in each AZ contribute to fault tolerance. Single instance and same AZ do not provide fault tolerance.

Answer

Using a single database instance without replication

Answer

Using a single large instance in one AZ

Question 6

A cloud architect is designing a solution that must automatically provision and configure compute, storage, and networking resources in a repeatable manner across multiple cloud providers. The solution must minimize manual intervention and ensure consistent configurations. Which approach best meets these requirements?

Accepted Answer

Infrastructure as Code (IaC) with cloud-agnostic tools like Terraform.. Infrastructure as Code with a cloud-agnostic tool like Terraform enables automated, repeatable, and consistent provisioning across multiple cloud providers. It treats infrastructure as software, allowing version control and collaboration, which minimizes manual intervention and ensures configurations are applied uniformly. This directly satisfies the scenario's requirements.

Answer

Implementing a hybrid cloud with a single management portal.

Answer

Manually creating resources through each cloud provider's web console.

Answer

Using provider-specific CLI scripts that are executed manually.

Question 7

A cloud architect is designing a globally distributed application on Google Cloud. The application must serve users from the closest possible point of presence with minimal latency while using a single anycast IP address. Which load balancing solution should the architect choose?

Accepted Answer

Global external Application Load Balancer. The global external Application Load Balancer is the only option that provides a single anycast IP address and automatically routes users to the closest healthy backend across Google Cloud regions. It is purpose-built for global, layer 7 applications that require minimal latency and high availability, making it the correct choice for this scenario.

Answer

Internal passthrough Network Load Balancer

Answer

External passthrough Network Load Balancer

Answer

Regional external Application Load Balancer

Question 8

A cloud engineer is designing a solution for a financial application that requires strict data residency in a specific country. The application must also be highly available across multiple data centers within that country. Which design consideration is most critical?

Accepted Answer

Deploying resources in multiple availability zones within the same region.. Deploying across multiple availability zones within the same region keeps data within the country while providing high availability through fault isolation. This satisfies both data residency and availability requirements without introducing cross-border data flows that could violate regulations.

Answer

Using a content delivery network (CDN) to cache data globally.

Answer

Using a global load balancer to distribute traffic across continents.

Answer

Implementing a multi-region active-active architecture.

Question 9

A cloud architect is designing a containerized microservices application that must handle unpredictable traffic spikes and scale rapidly. The architect wants to minimize operational overhead while ensuring high availability across multiple Availability Zones. Which solution best meets these requirements?

Accepted Answer

Use AWS Fargate with an Application Load Balancer and configure an ECS service that spans multiple Availability Zones.. AWS Fargate with an Application Load Balancer and a multi-AZ ECS service provides a serverless container platform that scales rapidly and eliminates server management. The Application Load Balancer offers advanced routing for microservices, and spanning multiple Availability Zones ensures high availability. This combination directly satisfies the need for minimal operational overhead and resilience.

Answer

Deploy the application on a cluster of EC2 instances managed by an Auto Scaling group, with a Classic Load Balancer distributing traffic.

Answer

Create an AWS Lambda function for each microservice and expose them through an API Gateway with caching enabled.

Answer

Deploy the application on a single large EC2 instance with an Elastic IP address and use Route 53 latency-based routing to direct traffic.

Question 10

A cloud architect is designing a new application that must be highly available across multiple geographic regions. The application uses a relational database that must be writable in the primary region and readable in a secondary region with minimal replication lag. Which AWS database feature should the architect implement to meet these requirements?

Accepted Answer

Amazon Aurora Global Database. The requirement is for a relational database that is writable in one region and readable in another with minimal replication lag. Amazon Aurora Global Database provides exactly this: a primary region for writes and secondary regions for reads with sub-second replication lag. Other options either do not support cross-region replication or do not provide the required low lag and relational capabilities.

Answer

Amazon DynamoDB global tables

Answer

Amazon RDS Multi-AZ deployment

Answer

Amazon RDS read replicas in a secondary region

Question 11

A cloud architect is designing a stateless containerized workload that must remain available even if an entire data center fails. The workload has no persistent local state and must be able to scale horizontally across regions. Which design decision BEST meets these requirements?

Accepted Answer

Deploy identical container clusters in two or more regions and use a global load balancer with health checks to route traffic to healthy regions.. The workload is stateless, so it can be replicated across regions without data consistency concerns. Running identical clusters in multiple regions behind a global load balancer with health checks ensures that traffic is automatically redirected away from a failed region, meeting the requirement to survive a full data center failure. This design also supports horizontal scaling by adding capacity in any region.

Answer

Deploy the containers on a single large virtual machine with a snapshot-based backup taken every hour.

Answer

Deploy the containers in a single region across multiple availability zones and rely on the orchestrator to reschedule failed tasks.

Answer

Deploy the containers in one region and configure a DNS failover record that points to a cold standby environment in another region.

Question 12

A cloud engineer is designing a storage solution for a high-performance database that requires consistent low-latency access to block-level storage. The database runs on a single virtual machine and must support frequent random read/write operations. Which storage type should the engineer choose?

Accepted Answer

A block storage volume attached to the virtual machine, provisioned with high IOPS.. A high-performance database requires block-level storage with consistent low latency and the ability to handle frequent random read/write operations. Block storage volumes attached to the virtual machine provide dedicated, high-IOPS storage that can be formatted and used directly by the database. Object storage, file shares, and CDNs do not offer the necessary block-level access or performance characteristics.

Answer

A managed file share using the SMB protocol.

Answer

A content delivery network (CDN) edge cache.

Answer

Object storage with a hierarchical namespace and eventual consistency.

Question 13

A company is migrating a legacy application to the cloud. The application uses a relational database and requires strong consistency and ACID transactions. Which cloud service model is most appropriate?

Accepted Answer

Platform as a Service (PaaS) with a managed relational database.. PaaS with a managed relational database is ideal because it provides a platform for the application while the managed database ensures ACID compliance and strong consistency. The company benefits from reduced operational overhead and can focus on the application, aligning with the migration goals.

Answer

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) with self-managed database servers.

Answer

Function as a Service (FaaS) with a serverless database.

Answer

Software as a Service (SaaS) with a built-in database.

Question 14

A cloud engineer is designing a serverless application that processes messages from an Amazon SQS queue. The application must scale automatically based on the number of messages in the queue and must handle failures gracefully by retrying failed messages. Which AWS service should the engineer use to run the application code?

Accepted Answer

AWS Lambda with an SQS trigger. AWS Lambda with an SQS trigger is the most suitable because it natively integrates with SQS, automatically scales based on the number of messages, and provides built-in retry and dead-letter queue support. Other options require manual scaling configuration or additional components to achieve the same level of integration and simplicity.

Answer

AWS Step Functions with a state machine

Answer

Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling group with a custom worker

Answer

AWS Fargate with an ECS service

Question 15

A company is migrating a legacy monolithic application to AWS. The application requires a relational database and must support read-heavy workloads with minimal latency for users across North America and Europe. The database must be highly available and provide automatic failover. Which AWS database solution should the architect recommend?

Accepted Answer

Amazon Aurora Global Database with a primary cluster in one region and secondary clusters in another region.. Amazon Aurora Global Database provides a relational database with global replication, low-latency reads, and fast failover. It is ideal for read-heavy workloads distributed across multiple regions. The storage-based replication ensures minimal lag, and secondary clusters can serve read traffic locally. This solution meets the requirements for high availability, automatic failover, and global low-latency access.

Answer

Amazon DynamoDB with global tables enabled and provisioned throughput in both regions.

Answer

Amazon Redshift with a multi-node cluster and cross-region snapshot copy.

Answer

Amazon RDS for MySQL with a Multi-AZ deployment and read replicas in both regions.