DVA-C02 Deployment Practice Question
A company uses AWS CloudFormation to deploy infrastructure. They have a stack that creates an Amazon RDS DB instance. They want to update the DB instance class without downtime. Which update policy should they use?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap is to assume that one of the listed options is a valid CloudFormation update policy for RDS. In fact, none of the provided options is a valid update policy for changing an RDS DB instance class, and UseLatestRestorableTime is not an update policy at all. CloudFormation does not have a built-in update policy that avoids downtime for RDS instance class changes.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
UseLatestRestorableTime
None of the listed options is correct. AWS CloudFormation does not have a built-in update policy that avoids downtime when changing the DB instance class of an RDS instance. To modify the instance class with minimal downtime, you can use a custom approach such as creating a read replica, promoting it, and updating DNS, or modifying the DB instance directly (which typically involves brief downtime). The options presented are either invalid or unrelated: UseLatestRestorableTime is a property for restoring from a snapshot or creating read replicas, not an update policy; AutoScalingRollingUpdate is for Auto Scaling groups; UpdateReplacePolicy controls replacement behavior; CreationPolicy controls creation signals.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
UseLatestRestorableTime
Why this is correct
UseLatestRestorableTime is not an update policy. It is a property used to restore from the latest restorable snapshot when creating a read replica or performing a restore operation. It does not affect updates to an existing DB instance class and does not minimize downtime.
- ✗
AutoScalingRollingUpdate
Why it's wrong here
AutoScalingRollingUpdate is a policy for Auto Scaling groups to update instances in a rolling fashion. It is not applicable to Amazon RDS DB instances, which are stateful and updated differently.
- ✗
UpdateReplacePolicy
Why it's wrong here
UpdateReplacePolicy is a stack-level policy that determines what happens to resources when they are replaced during a stack update. It is not specific to RDS and does not inherently avoid downtime for DB class changes.
- ✗
CreationPolicy
Why it's wrong here
CreationPolicy is used to wait for signals before declaring a resource creation successful. It has no effect on updates and cannot reduce downtime during an instance class modification.
Go deeper
Related to this question
About these practice questions
This DVA-C02 question is part of Courseiva's 724-question bank — original exam-style content with full explanations and wrong-answer analysis, never real exam questions or exam dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DVA-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the DVA-C02 exam.