CKAD Practice Test 2 — 30 Questions

Question 1

A pod has a container with envFrom referencing a ConfigMap. The ConfigMap has keys 'APP_DEBUG=true' and 'APP_NAME=myapp'. The pod also has an env entry with name 'APP_DEBUG' set to 'false'. What is the value of APP_DEBUG in the container?

Choose an answer to begin — your selection is scored in the full session.

Accepted Answer

false. When a pod has both an `envFrom` referencing a ConfigMap and an explicit `env` entry with the same key, the explicit `env` entry takes precedence. This is because Kubernetes merges environment variables from multiple sources, and individual `env` entries override any values from `envFrom` for the same key. Therefore, `APP_DEBUG` will be set to 'false' as defined in the explicit `env` entry.

Answer

undefined

Answer

Both values are concatenated

Answer

true

Question 2

Which THREE of the following are correct about init containers? (Select THREE.)

Accepted Answer

They run to completion before the main application containers start. Init containers are designed to run sequentially to completion before any of the pod's regular application containers start. This ensures that prerequisites, such as database schema migrations or configuration file generation, are completed before the main application begins execution.

Answer

They cannot have resource limits set

Answer

They run after the main application containers have started

Question 3

Which THREE commands can be used to get detailed information about a pod named 'my-pod'? (Choose three.)

Accepted Answer

kubectl get pod my-pod -o json. `kubectl get pod my-pod -o json` retrieves the full object representation of the pod in JSON format, which includes all fields such as metadata, spec, status, and annotations. This provides detailed, machine-readable information about the pod's current state and configuration.

Answer

kubectl logs my-pod

Answer

kubectl exec my-pod -- env

Question 4

Which of the following is the correct way to scale a Deployment named 'api' to 5 replicas using kubectl?

Accepted Answer

kubectl scale deployment api --replicas=5. `kubectl scale deployment api --replicas=5` is the standard kubectl command to change the replica count of a Deployment. The `scale` subcommand directly modifies the `.spec.replicas` field in the Deployment's manifest, instructing the ReplicaSet controller to adjust the number of Pods to match the desired count.

Answer

kubectl scale deploy api 5

Answer

kubectl update deployment api --replicas=5

Answer

kubectl set replicas deployment api 5

Question 5

Which TWO statements about readiness probes are correct? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Readiness probes run continuously after the container starts. Readiness probes are designed to run continuously throughout the lifecycle of a container, not just during startup. They are periodically executed by the kubelet to determine whether the container is ready to accept traffic, and their success or failure directly controls the pod's inclusion in Service endpoints.

Answer

Readiness probes are only used during initial startup

Answer

Readiness probes can only be of type httpGet

Answer

Readiness probes restart the container if they fail

Question 6

A NetworkPolicy is applied to a namespace with the following rules:
```
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: NetworkPolicy
metadata:
  name: deny-all
spec:
  podSelector: {}
  policyTypes:
  - Ingress
```
What is the effect on pods in that namespace?

Accepted Answer

All inbound traffic is denied, outbound traffic is allowed. This NetworkPolicy selects all pods in the namespace (podSelector: {}) and specifies only Ingress in policyTypes. By default, if any NetworkPolicy selects a pod, all traffic not explicitly allowed by a rule is denied. Since no ingress rules are defined, all inbound traffic is denied. Outbound traffic is not restricted because Egress is not listed in policyTypes and no egress rules are defined, so it remains allowed by default.

Answer

All traffic is allowed

Answer

Only traffic from specific namespaces is allowed

Answer

All inbound and outbound traffic is denied

Question 7

A Service named `api` in namespace `default` has multiple endpoints. You run `kubectl get endpoints api` and see no IPs. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The Service selector does not match any pods. The most likely cause is that the Service's selector does not match any pods. A Service uses its label selector to identify pods and automatically populate its endpoints. If no pods match the selector, the endpoints list will be empty, resulting in no IPs shown by `kubectl get endpoints api`.

Answer

The Service type is ExternalName

Answer

The namespace has a NetworkPolicy blocking traffic

Answer

The Service has a clusterIP of None

Question 8

Which TWO statements about init containers are true? (Select 2)

Accepted Answer

Init containers run sequentially in the order they are defined.. Init containers in a Kubernetes Pod are executed sequentially in the exact order they are defined in the `initContainers` array. Each init container must exit successfully (return code 0) before the next one starts, ensuring a strict dependency chain for initialization tasks.

Answer

Init containers support liveness and readiness probes.

Answer

Init containers share the same filesystem as the application containers by default.

Answer

Init containers have a restart policy of Always.

Question 9

An Ingress has two rules:
- host: app.example.com, path: /api -> service-a:80
- host: api.example.com, path: / -> service-b:80
A request to `app.example.com/api/v1` reaches which service?

Accepted Answer

service-a. Ingress rules match the longest prefix of the request path for the given host. For `app.example.com/api/v1`, the path `/api` is a prefix match (since `/api/v1` starts with `/api`), so it routes to service-a:80. The second rule requires host `api.example.com`, which does not match, so service-b is not considered.

Answer

Both services

Answer

Neither service

Answer

service-b

Question 10

Which THREE of the following are true about Kubernetes Services? (Select 3)

Accepted Answer

The NodePort range is 30000-32767 by default.. The default NodePort range in Kubernetes is 30000-32767, as defined by the kube-apiserver's --service-node-port-range flag. This range ensures that NodePorts do not conflict with well-known or ephemeral ports used by system services.

Answer

Headless Services have a ClusterIP assigned.

Answer

Services can only expose one port.

Question 11

When performing a rolling update of a Deployment, which field in the Deployment spec controls the maximum number of Pods that can be created above the desired replicas during the update?

Accepted Answer

spec.strategy.rollingUpdate.maxSurge. maxSurge defines how many Pods can be created above the desired replica count during a rolling update.

Answer

spec.strategy.type

Answer

spec.strategy.rollingUpdate.maxUnavailable

Answer

spec.replicas

Question 12

Which THREE of the following are valid fields for configuring a probe in Kubernetes? (Select 3)

Accepted Answer

initialDelaySeconds. `initialDelaySeconds` is a valid field in a Kubernetes probe configuration (e.g., livenessProbe, readinessProbe, startupProbe). It defines the number of seconds after the container has started before the probe is initiated, allowing the application time to initialize before health checks begin.

Answer

retrySeconds

Answer

intervalSeconds

Question 13

Which TWO statements about Services are true? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

A Service of type LoadBalancer automatically creates a NodePort Service.. When a Service of type LoadBalancer is created, Kubernetes automatically creates a corresponding NodePort Service (and a ClusterIP Service) as part of its implementation. The cloud load balancer routes external traffic to the NodePort on each node, which then forwards to the ClusterIP. This is defined in the Kubernetes Service specification and is a core behavior of the LoadBalancer type.

Answer

A Service of type ClusterIP is accessible from outside the cluster.

Answer

A Service of type ExternalName requires a selector to route traffic.

Answer

A headless Service has clusterIP set to "0.0.0.0".

Question 14

Which TWO approaches can be used to expose a Secret's value as an environment variable in a pod?

Accepted Answer

env:
  - name: MY_SECRET
    valueFrom:
      secretKeyRef:
        name: my-secret
        key: my-key. The `valueFrom.secretKeyRef` field in a container's `env` definition directly references a specific key from a Kubernetes Secret and injects its value as an environment variable. This is the standard method for exposing a single secret key as an environment variable, as defined in the Kubernetes API.

Answer

volumeMounts:
  - name: secret-volume
    mountPath: /etc/secret

Answer

env:
  - name: MY_SECRET
    value: "$(MY_SECRET)"

Answer

env:
  - name: MY_SECRET
    valueFrom:
      configMapKeyRef:
        name: my-secret
        key: my-key

Question 15

Which TWO statements about NetworkPolicy are correct? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

NetworkPolicy uses labels to select pods within a namespace. NetworkPolicy uses label selectors in its `spec.podSelector` field to identify which pods within a namespace the policy applies to. This allows fine-grained control over traffic to and from specific sets of pods based on their labels, without needing to reference pod names or IPs.

Answer

If no NetworkPolicy selects a pod, then that pod is isolated and traffic is denied

Answer

NetworkPolicy is only applicable to Services

Answer

NetworkPolicy is a cluster-scoped resource

Question 16

You have a Deployment with 'replicas: 3' and the HPA is configured with 'targetCPUUtilizationPercentage: 80'. The current CPU usage is at 60% across all pods, but the HPA has scaled up to 5 replicas. What is the most likely reason?

Accepted Answer

The CPU request in the Deployment's resource spec might be set lower than expected, causing the HPA to perceive higher utilization.. The HPA calculates CPU utilization as the average CPU usage across all pods divided by the CPU request of each pod. If the Deployment's container resource requests are set to a value that is lower than expected (e.g., 0.5 CPU instead of 1.0 CPU), then the same absolute CPU usage results in a higher utilization percentage. With 3 pods at 60% actual usage but a low CPU request, the utilization relative to the request could exceed the 80% target, triggering scale-up to 5 replicas. Therefore, option A is the most likely reason: a mismatch in the CPU request on the Deployment's resource spec causes the HPA to perceive higher utilization.

Answer

The HPA has a behavior policy that scales up aggressively

Answer

The HPA is using the 'averageUtilization' target type on a custom metric, not CPU

Answer

The HPA is reading the total CPU usage instead of average

Question 17

Which TWO of the following are valid ways to mount a Secret into a pod as environment variables? (Select exactly 2)

Accepted Answer

env:
- name: SECRET_KEY
  valueFrom:
    secretKeyRef:
      name: my-secret
      key: key. `secretKeyRef` is the standard Kubernetes API field for referencing a specific key from a Secret object and injecting its value as an environment variable. Option E is correct because `envFrom` with `secretRef` allows you to load all key-value pairs from a Secret as environment variables into the pod, which is a valid and common pattern.

Answer

env:
- name: SECRET_KEY
  valueFrom:
    configMapKeyRef:
      name: my-secret
      key: key

Answer

env:
- name: SECRET_KEY
  valueFrom:
    secretEnvRef:
      name: my-secret
      key: key

Answer

envFrom:
- configMapRef:
    name: my-secret

Question 18

Which THREE of the following are valid parameters for configuring probes? (Select 3)

Accepted Answer

timeoutSeconds. In Kubernetes, probe configuration parameters are defined in the container spec within a Pod. `timeoutSeconds` is a valid parameter that specifies the number of seconds after which the probe times out, defaulting to 1 second if not set. It is used in liveness, readiness, and startup probes to control how long kubelet waits for a probe response before considering it failed.

Answer

retryIntervalSeconds

Answer

cooldownSeconds

Question 19

You have just applied a new Deployment configuration using 'kubectl apply -f deployment.yaml'. You want to see the latest revision number of the rollout. Which command should you run?

Accepted Answer

kubectl rollout history deployment/myapp. 'kubectl rollout history deployment/<name>' shows revision history with revision numbers. The latest revision is shown as the most recent.

Answer

kubectl rollout status deployment/myapp

Answer

kubectl get deployment myapp -o yaml

Answer

kubectl describe deployment myapp

Question 20

To prevent a container from running as root, which field should be set in the securityContext?

Accepted Answer

runAsNonRoot: true. The `runAsNonRoot: true` field in the securityContext explicitly prevents the container from running as the root user (UID 0). When set, Kubernetes will refuse to start the container if the image is configured to run as root, enforcing a non-root execution policy at the pod or container level. This is the direct and intended mechanism for ensuring the container does not run with root privileges.

Answer

runAsUser: 1000

Answer

allowPrivilegeEscalation: false

Answer

readOnlyRootFilesystem: true