The answer is to monitor ALB’s HealthyHostCount, EC2’s StatusCheckFailed, and RDS’s DatabaseConnections metrics for multi-tier application health. These three metrics directly indicate component health: HealthyHostCount reveals how many targets the load balancer considers healthy, StatusCheckFailed detects underlying EC2 instance or system issues, and DatabaseConnections signals when the database is overwhelmed or rejecting new connections, which is a clear health symptom. On the AWS Certified DevOps Engineer Professional DOP-C02 exam, this question tests your ability to distinguish between health indicators and performance metrics—a common trap is confusing metrics like RequestCount or ReadLatency, which measure traffic or performance rather than binary health status. Remember the memory tip: “Health is binary, performance is a spectrum”—if a metric can go up or down without breaking the component, it’s likely a performance metric, not a health metric.
DOP-C02 Monitoring and Logging Practice Question
This DOP-C02 practice question tests your understanding of monitoring and logging. Read the scenario carefully and evaluate each option against the stated constraints before committing to an answer. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
A DevOps engineer is designing a monitoring solution for a multi-tier web application hosted on AWS. The application consists of an Application Load Balancer (ALB), a fleet of EC2 instances in an Auto Scaling group, and an Amazon RDS database. The engineer needs to monitor the health of each component and receive alerts when any component becomes unhealthy. Which of the following CloudWatch metrics should the engineer monitor? (Select THREE.)
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
EC2's StatusCheckFailed metric.
Option A is correct because ALB's HealthyHostCount indicates how many targets are healthy. Option B is correct because EC2's StatusCheckFailed (instance status) detects underlying issues. Option D is correct because RDS's DatabaseConnections can indicate if the database is overwhelmed. Option C (ALB's RequestCount) measures traffic, not health. Option E (RDS's ReadLatency) is a performance metric, not a direct health indicator.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✗
RDS's ReadLatency metric.
Why it's wrong here
Performance metric, not a direct health indicator.
✗
Application Load Balancer's RequestCount metric.
Why it's wrong here
Measures request volume, not health.
✓
EC2's StatusCheckFailed metric.
Why this is correct
Detects instance-level issues like hardware or software problems.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Indicates the number of healthy targets behind the ALB.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✓
RDS's DatabaseConnections metric.
Why this is correct
Monitors the number of connections to the database, which relates to health.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
Many certification questions include familiar terms but test a specific constraint. Read the exact wording before choosing an answer that is generally true but wrong for this case.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
This question should be treated as a scenario, not a definition check. Identify the problem, the constraint and the best action. Then compare each option against those facts.
KKey Concepts to Remember
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
Use explanations to understand the rule behind the answer.
TExam Day Tips
→Underline the problem statement mentally.
→Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
→Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
A media company stores terabytes of video archives that are accessed once a year for audit purposes. Moving these objects to a cold storage tier (Azure Archive, S3 Glacier, or Google Nearline) costs a fraction of hot storage. Questions like this test whether you understand storage tiers, access frequency tradeoffs, and retrieval latency requirements.
What to study next
Got this wrong? Here's your next step.
Identify which DOP-C02 exam domain this question belongs to, then review the specific concept being tested. Practise related questions in that domain and focus on understanding why each wrong answer is tempting — not just why the correct answer is right.
Monitoring and Logging — This question tests Monitoring and Logging — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: EC2's StatusCheckFailed metric. — Option A is correct because ALB's HealthyHostCount indicates how many targets are healthy. Option B is correct because EC2's StatusCheckFailed (instance status) detects underlying issues. Option D is correct because RDS's DatabaseConnections can indicate if the database is overwhelmed. Option C (ALB's RequestCount) measures traffic, not health. Option E (RDS's ReadLatency) is a performance metric, not a direct health indicator.
What should I do if I get this DOP-C02 question wrong?
Identify which DOP-C02 exam domain this question belongs to, then review the specific concept being tested. Practise related questions in that domain and focus on understanding why each wrong answer is tempting — not just why the correct answer is right.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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This DOP-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 DOP-C02 exam.
Question Discussion
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