- A
Implement a predictive scaling policy combined with dynamic scaling to proactively adjust capacity based on forecasted traffic.
Predictive scaling uses historical data to forecast demand and proactively adjust capacity, preventing the healthy host count from dropping to zero.
- B
Implement a scheduled scaling policy that increases capacity 30 minutes before the expected peak.
Why wrong: Scheduled scaling is useful for predictable patterns but may not handle unexpected spikes.
- C
Increase the health check grace period to 600 seconds to give new instances more time to become healthy.
Why wrong: Increasing grace period delays the inclusion of new instances, potentially worsening the issue.
- D
Switch to a step scaling policy with a lower cooldown period and a greater scaling adjustment.
Why wrong: Step scaling is reactive; even with lower cooldown, it may not prevent the momentary zero healthy hosts.
DOP-C02 Resilient Cloud Solutions Practice Question
This DOP-C02 practice question tests your understanding of resilient cloud solutions. The scenario asks you to isolate a root cause — eliminate options that address a different problem before choosing. 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.
Your company runs a multi-tier web application on AWS. The web tier consists of EC2 instances behind an Application Load Balancer (ALB) in an Auto Scaling group across three Availability Zones. The application tier runs on a separate Auto Scaling group of EC2 instances that process requests from the web tier. The database tier uses an Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL Multi-AZ deployment. All application servers write logs to Amazon CloudWatch Logs. Recently, the operations team reported that during peak hours, the web tier experiences intermittent 503 errors. The ALB access logs show that the errors occur when the target group's healthy host count drops to zero momentarily. The Auto Scaling group's minimum and desired capacity is 6, with a maximum of 12. The scaling policy is based on average CPU utilization, with a target of 60%. The health check grace period is 300 seconds. The application health check endpoint returns a 200 status when healthy. The DevOps engineer suspects that the scaling policy is too slow to react to traffic spikes. The engineer wants to implement a more proactive scaling approach. Which solution should the engineer implement?
Clue words in this question
Noticing these words before you look at the options changes how you read each choice.
Clue:
"minimum / minimize"Why it matters: Asks for the least resource use — fewest addresses, smallest subnet, lowest overhead. Eliminate over-provisioned options even if they would technically work.
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
Implement a predictive scaling policy combined with dynamic scaling to proactively adjust capacity based on forecasted traffic.
Predictive scaling (option A) uses machine learning to analyze historical traffic and forecast future demand, allowing the Auto Scaling group to proactively add capacity before traffic spikes occur. This prevents the momentary drop to zero healthy hosts that causes 503 errors. Dynamic scaling (target tracking) is reactive and may lag behind sudden spikes, leading to the observed issue. Scheduled scaling (option B) is only effective if traffic patterns are perfectly predictable and does not handle unexpected spikes. Increasing the health check grace period (option C) addresses instance initialization time, not scaling speed, and may delay detection of unhealthy instances. Step scaling (option D) is still reactive and has a cooldown that can prevent rapid adjustments, making it less effective for proactive scaling.
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.
- ✓
Implement a predictive scaling policy combined with dynamic scaling to proactively adjust capacity based on forecasted traffic.
Why this is correct
Predictive scaling uses historical data to forecast demand and proactively adjust capacity, preventing the healthy host count from dropping to zero.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "minimum / minimize" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- ✗
Implement a scheduled scaling policy that increases capacity 30 minutes before the expected peak.
Why it's wrong here
Scheduled scaling is useful for predictable patterns but may not handle unexpected spikes.
- ✗
Increase the health check grace period to 600 seconds to give new instances more time to become healthy.
Why it's wrong here
Increasing grace period delays the inclusion of new instances, potentially worsening the issue.
- ✗
Switch to a step scaling policy with a lower cooldown period and a greater scaling adjustment.
Why it's wrong here
Step scaling is reactive; even with lower cooldown, it may not prevent the momentary zero healthy hosts.
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.
- →
Resilient Cloud Solutions — study guide chapter
Learn the concepts, then practise the questions
- →
Resilient Cloud Solutions practice questions
Targeted practice on this topic area only
- →
All DOP-C02 questions
1,750 questions across all exam domains
- →
AWS Certified DevOps Engineer Professional DOP-C02 study guide
Full concept coverage aligned to exam objectives
- →
DOP-C02 practice test guide
How to use practice tests most effectively before exam day
Related practice questions
Related DOP-C02 practice-question pages
Use these pages to review the topic behind this question. This is how one missed question becomes focused revision.
Configuration Management and IaC practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to Configuration Management and IaC.
Resilient Cloud Solutions practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to Resilient Cloud Solutions.
Monitoring and Logging practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to Monitoring and Logging.
Incident and Event Response practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to Incident and Event Response.
Security and Compliance practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to Security and Compliance.
SDLC Automation practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to SDLC Automation.
DOP-C02 fundamentals practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to DOP-C02 fundamentals.
DOP-C02 scenario practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to DOP-C02 scenario.
DOP-C02 troubleshooting practice questions
Practise DOP-C02 questions linked to DOP-C02 troubleshooting.
Practice this exam
Start a free DOP-C02 practice session
Short sessions build daily habit. Longer sessions build exam-day stamina. Try a timed session to simulate real conditions.
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this DOP-C02 question test?
Resilient Cloud Solutions — This question tests Resilient Cloud Solutions — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Implement a predictive scaling policy combined with dynamic scaling to proactively adjust capacity based on forecasted traffic. — Predictive scaling (option A) uses machine learning to analyze historical traffic and forecast future demand, allowing the Auto Scaling group to proactively add capacity before traffic spikes occur. This prevents the momentary drop to zero healthy hosts that causes 503 errors. Dynamic scaling (target tracking) is reactive and may lag behind sudden spikes, leading to the observed issue. Scheduled scaling (option B) is only effective if traffic patterns are perfectly predictable and does not handle unexpected spikes. Increasing the health check grace period (option C) addresses instance initialization time, not scaling speed, and may delay detection of unhealthy instances. Step scaling (option D) is still reactive and has a cooldown that can prevent rapid adjustments, making it less effective for proactive scaling.
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.
Are there clue words in this question I should notice?
Yes — watch for: "minimum / minimize". Asks for the least resource use — fewest addresses, smallest subnet, lowest overhead. Eliminate over-provisioned options even if they would technically work.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
About these practice questions
Courseiva creates original exam-style practice questions with explanations and wrong-answer analysis. It does not publish real exam questions, exam dumps, or protected exam content. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
Keep practising
More DOP-C02 practice questions
- A company uses AWS CodePipeline with a multi-branch strategy. A new feature branch triggers a pipeline that runs unit te…
- A development team uses AWS CodeBuild to compile a Java application and run unit tests. The build takes 30 minutes, but…
- A company uses AWS CodePipeline with multiple stages: Source (Amazon S3), Build (AWS CodeBuild), and Deploy (AWS CodeDep…
- A company uses AWS CodeCommit for source control. Developers frequently push large binary files (e.g., compiled JARs) to…
- A company runs a Stateful application on EC2 that requires sticky sessions. They use an ALB with duration-based stickine…
- An organization uses AWS CodePipeline to orchestrate deployments to multiple environments (dev, test, prod). Each enviro…
Last reviewed: Jun 20, 2026
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
Share a tip, memory trick, or ask about the reasoning behind this question. Do not post real exam questions, leaked content, braindumps, or copyrighted exam material. Comments are moderated and may be removed without notice.
Sign in to join the discussion.