45 of 120 questions · Page 2/2 · Clp Architecture Design topic · Answers revealed
An organization needs to connect its on-premises data center to a public cloud with a dedicated, low-latency, and consistent network connection. Which connectivity option should they use?
Direct Connect provides a dedicated private connection with consistent performance.
Why this answer
Direct Connect (AWS) or ExpressRoute (Azure) provides dedicated private connectivity from on-premises to cloud.
A company is designing stateless application tiers to support horizontal scaling. Which TWO design principles support statelessness? (Select TWO.)
Shared database allows any instance to serve any request.
Why this answer
Storing session state in an external cache or database makes the application stateless. Local storage is stateful. Sticky sessions break statelessness.
Using configuration files per instance is stateful.
Which cloud deployment model connects an on-premises data center to a public cloud using VPN or dedicated connections like AWS Direct Connect?
Hybrid cloud combines on-premises and public cloud.
Why this answer
Hybrid cloud integrates on-premises and public cloud resources via private networking.
A company is deploying a web application on Google Cloud that requires low-latency access to static content (images, CSS) for global users. The application also needs to handle SSL termination to reduce load on backend instances. Which TWO services should the architect use? (Select TWO.)
CDN caches static content at the edge for low-latency delivery.
Why this answer
Cloud CDN (Option C) is correct because it uses Google's global edge cache to deliver static content (images, CSS) with low latency by caching content at points of presence (PoPs) close to users. Cloud Load Balancing (Option D) is correct because it provides global anycast-based load balancing with integrated SSL termination, offloading the SSL/TLS handshake from backend instances and reducing their CPU load.
Exam trap
Cisco often tests the misconception that Cloud Storage alone can serve static content globally with low latency, but it lacks edge caching and SSL termination, requiring Cloud CDN and Cloud Load Balancing to meet the requirements.
A cloud architect is evaluating cloud deployment models for a healthcare application that must comply with data sovereignty regulations. The solution must provide the lowest latency for users in North America and Europe, and must avoid vendor lock-in. Which TWO deployment models should the architect consider? (Choose two.)
Multi-cloud can use multiple providers to avoid lock-in and place resources in different regions.
Why this answer
Multi-cloud uses multiple public clouds to avoid vendor lock-in and can place resources in North America and Europe. Hybrid cloud can keep sensitive data on-premises while using public cloud for compute, but does not directly address multiple regions; however, the combination of both can meet all requirements, but the question asks for TWO models. Multi-cloud and hybrid cloud together provide flexibility and compliance.
However, given the options, the best two are multi-cloud and hybrid cloud. Note: The question says 'Which TWO' so exactly two correct.
A cloud architect is selecting a storage solution for a database that requires low-latency reads and writes. The database will run on a single VM and must support consistent performance. Which storage type is most appropriate?
Block storage provides dedicated, low-latency performance for databases.
Why this answer
Block storage (e.g., EBS, Azure Disk) provides low-latency, consistent performance suitable for databases running on a single VM.
A cloud architect is designing a disaster recovery solution for a critical database. The RTO is 4 hours and the RPO is 1 hour. Which replication strategy should the architect choose to meet these requirements?
Correct. Warm standby can achieve RPO of 1 hour and RTO of 4 hours.
Why this answer
Warm standby maintains a partially scaled environment with frequent replication, meeting an RPO of 1 hour and RTO of 4 hours.
A cloud engineer is designing a VPC in AWS for a three-tier web application. The web servers must be accessible from the internet, the application servers must be isolated from the internet but reachable by web servers, and the database servers must be isolated from both. How many subnets should be created, and which type should each be?
This provides proper isolation: web in public, app in private, database in isolated private subnet.
Why this answer
A three-tier architecture typically uses three subnets: public for web servers, private for application servers, and a database subnet (often private with additional restrictions). The database subnet is typically private, but the question asks for isolation, implying a separate subnet tier. A single subnet cannot provide isolation.
Two subnets would combine two tiers, violating isolation.
A company is using AWS and wants to minimize costs for a batch processing workload that runs for 2 hours every night. The workload can tolerate interruptions. Which pricing model should the company choose?
Spot instances offer the lowest cost and are suitable for fault-tolerant, short-lived workloads.
Why this answer
Spot instances offer significant discounts and are suitable for fault-tolerant, interruptible workloads. The workload's short duration and tolerance for interruption make spot instances ideal for cost savings.
A company uses a public cloud PaaS service to run a custom application. They need to ensure the application can handle increased load without downtime. Which action should they take?
Auto-scaling adjusts resources automatically based on demand.
Why this answer
Configuring auto-scaling for the PaaS service allows it to automatically add instances based on load, ensuring high availability without manual intervention.
A company is migrating a legacy stateful application to the cloud. The application currently runs on a single server and stores session data locally. To enable horizontal scaling, which two design changes should the architect recommend? (Select TWO.)
Externalizing session state allows any instance to serve any user.
Why this answer
To horizontally scale a stateful application, session data must be externalized (e.g., to a database or cache) and the application should be designed to be stateless so any instance can handle any request.
An organization is designing a VPC with public and private subnets. The web servers must be accessible from the internet, but database servers must not. The architecture also requires high availability across two Availability Zones. What is the minimum number of public subnets and private subnets needed?
Each AZ gets a public and a private subnet.
Why this answer
For high availability across two AZs, you need at least two public subnets (one per AZ) and two private subnets (one per AZ).
Which cloud deployment model involves using services from multiple public cloud providers to avoid vendor lock-in and leverage best-of-breed solutions?
Multi-cloud uses multiple public clouds to avoid vendor lock-in.
Why this answer
Multi-cloud is the use of multiple public cloud providers to gain flexibility and avoid dependency on a single vendor.
A company wants to minimize cloud costs for a batch processing job that runs for a few hours each night and can be interrupted. Which pricing model is most appropriate?
Spot instances are low-cost but can be reclaimed.
Why this answer
Spot/preemptible instances offer significant discounts but can be terminated if capacity is needed elsewhere, suitable for fault-tolerant and interruptible workloads.
A company is deploying a global web application and wants to reduce latency for users around the world. The application serves static content (images, CSS) and dynamic API responses. Which combination of services should the architect use?
CDN reduces latency for static files; latency-based routing directs dynamic requests to the nearest region.
Why this answer
CDN caches static content at edge locations, reducing latency. For dynamic content, a global load balancer with latency-based routing directs users to the closest region. DNS alone cannot reduce latency for dynamic content.
A single load balancer does not provide global distribution.
An organization is migrating to AWS and wants to optimize costs for a production database that runs 24/7. Which TWO pricing models would provide the most cost savings while ensuring the database is not interrupted? (Select TWO.)
Reserved instances offer up to 75% discount for 1- or 3-year terms, suitable for steady-state workloads.
Why this answer
Reserved Instances provide significant discounts for steady-state workloads like a production database that runs 24/7. Compute Savings Plans offer flexible, cost-effective pricing across instance families with a commitment to consistent usage. Both ensure uninterrupted operation because they guarantee capacity and are not subject to interruption.
On-demand (B) is more expensive for long-term use, Spot instances (D) can be terminated without notice, and Dedicated hosts (A) are primarily for licensing or compliance requirements and are typically more costly.
An organization maintains a private cloud using OpenStack and also uses AWS for additional capacity. They have a critical application that must remain available even if one cloud provider goes offline. The application is deployed in both environments with active load balancing. Which cloud deployment model best describes this architecture?
Hybrid cloud combines on-premises private cloud with public cloud.
Why this answer
The architecture uses both a private cloud (OpenStack) and a public cloud (AWS) with active load balancing to ensure availability even if one provider fails. This is the defining characteristic of a hybrid cloud, which integrates private and public cloud resources while maintaining orchestration between them.
Exam trap
Cisco often tests the distinction between hybrid cloud and multi-cloud by including a private cloud component in the scenario; candidates mistakenly choose multi-cloud when they see multiple providers, but hybrid cloud is correct when one of them is private.
How to eliminate wrong answers
Option A is wrong because multi-cloud refers to using multiple public cloud providers (e.g., AWS and Azure) without a private cloud component, whereas this scenario includes a private cloud. Option B is wrong because public cloud alone would not include the organization's private OpenStack infrastructure. Option C is wrong because private cloud alone would not include the AWS public cloud resources.
A company uses Azure and needs shared file storage accessible from multiple Linux VMs using standard file sharing protocols. Which storage type should they choose?
Azure Files offers fully managed file shares accessible via SMB and NFS.
Why this answer
Azure Files provides managed file shares accessible via SMB and NFS protocols.
An organization needs to store archival data for 7 years to meet compliance requirements. The data is rarely accessed, and retrieval time is not critical. Which cloud storage type is most cost-effective?
Archive storage is optimized for long-term retention at low cost.
Why this answer
Archive storage (e.g., AWS Glacier, Azure Archive) is designed for long-term, infrequently accessed data at the lowest cost. Block storage is for VMs. Object storage is for frequent access.
File storage is for shared file systems.
A company runs a web application on AWS EC2 instances behind an Application Load Balancer. They want to handle traffic spikes automatically. Which scaling approach should they implement?
Auto-scaling automatically adjusts capacity based on defined metrics.
Why this answer
Auto-scaling adds or removes instances based on metrics like CPU utilization, handling traffic spikes automatically.
A company wants to reduce its cloud storage costs for infrequently accessed data that must be retained for 7 years. Which two storage lifecycle policies should they implement? (Select TWO.)
Infrequent access tiers are cheaper for data accessed less often.
Why this answer
Option C is correct because transitioning data to a lower-cost infrequent access tier after 30 days aligns with the requirement to reduce costs for infrequently accessed data. This lifecycle policy moves objects from a standard tier to a cheaper tier (e.g., Amazon S3 Standard-IA or Azure Cool Blob Storage) after a specified period, reducing storage costs while maintaining low-latency retrieval. Option D is correct because archiving data to cold storage after 1 year (e.g., Amazon S3 Glacier or Azure Archive Blob Storage) further reduces costs for data that is rarely accessed but must be retained for 7 years, as cold storage offers the lowest storage cost at the expense of longer retrieval times.
Exam trap
Cisco often tests the distinction between lifecycle policies (which automate tier transitions) and billing optimizations (like reserved capacity), leading candidates to incorrectly select reserved capacity as a lifecycle policy instead of a cost-saving commitment.
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.)
Azure Files offers managed SMB file shares accessible from cloud VMs and on-premises.
Why this answer
File storage services like Amazon EFS and Azure Files provide shared file systems accessible over NFS or SMB. Block and object storage are not typically used as shared file systems.
A company is designing a disaster recovery plan for its critical application. The application must be recovered within 4 hours (RTO) and can tolerate up to 1 hour of data loss (RPO). Which replication strategy is most cost-effective?
Asynchronous replication can achieve RPO of 1 hour at lower cost.
Why this answer
Asynchronous replication meets the RPO of 1 hour (data loss up to 1 hour) and can be lower cost than synchronous replication, which requires high bandwidth. Synchronous replication would be more expensive and unnecessary. No replication would not meet RPO.
Daily backups would exceed RPO.
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.)
Stateless design allows any instance to handle any request without session affinity.
Why this answer
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.
A cloud administrator needs to provide a shared file system that can be accessed by multiple Linux-based virtual machines in the same VPC. Which storage type should be used?
File storage provides a shared file system over NFS/SMB.
Why this answer
File storage (e.g., Amazon EFS, Azure Files) provides a shared file system accessible via NFS or SMB, suitable for multiple VMs.
A company is deploying a stateless application across multiple Availability Zones in AWS. The application must automatically scale based on CPU utilization. Which combination of services should the architect use to achieve this?
Auto Scaling group handles scaling, and Application Load Balancer distributes HTTP/HTTPS traffic across instances.
Why this answer
Auto Scaling groups manage instance scaling across AZs, and Application Load Balancer distributes traffic; this combination provides elasticity and high availability.
A company is designing a multi-cloud strategy to ensure high availability across AWS and Azure. They want to use a global load balancer to route traffic based on latency. Which THREE components are required for this setup? (Select THREE.)
Health checks ensure traffic is only sent to healthy endpoints.
Why this answer
Health checks, latency-based routing, and DNS services are essential. Global load balancers at each provider and a CDN are not required for latency-based routing.
A cloud administrator is optimizing costs for a batch processing workload that runs nightly for 2 hours. The workload can tolerate interruptions. Which THREE purchasing options should the administrator consider? (Choose three.)
Preemptible VMs are cost-effective and can be interrupted, ideal for batch jobs.
Why this answer
Correct answer: Preemptible VMs, Spot instances, and On-demand instances. For a batch processing workload that runs nightly for only 2 hours and can tolerate interruptions, cost optimization favors using interruptible instances like Preemptible VMs (Google Cloud) or Spot instances (AWS/Azure) because they offer significant discounts and are suitable for fault-tolerant workloads. On-demand instances are also an option to consider when interruptible instances are not available or if the workload requires guaranteed capacity, though they are more expensive.
Reserved instances or dedicated hosts are not cost-effective for such short, periodic workloads because they require long-term commitments (1 or 3 years) and are designed for steady-state usage. Therefore, the three options to consider are Preemptible VMs, Spot instances, and On-demand instances.
A financial services firm requires a cloud deployment that keeps sensitive customer data on-premises while bursting compute-intensive risk analysis workloads to a public cloud during peak times. Which deployment model best meets this requirement?
Correct. Hybrid cloud allows data to remain on-premises while bursting workloads to public cloud.
Why this answer
Hybrid cloud connects on-premises infrastructure with public cloud, enabling data residency and burst capacity.
A cloud architect is deploying a web application across multiple availability zones within a single region to achieve high availability. The application requires that if one availability zone fails, traffic should automatically be rerouted to the remaining zones without manual intervention. Which configuration is required?
Active-active across AZs with a load balancer provides automatic failover within the region.
Why this answer
Option B is correct because deploying an active-active configuration across multiple availability zones with a load balancer ensures that traffic is automatically distributed to healthy instances. If one availability zone fails, the load balancer's health checks detect the failure and reroute traffic to the remaining zones without manual intervention, meeting the high availability requirement.
Exam trap
The trap here is that candidates often confuse high availability with disaster recovery, mistakenly choosing a cross-region active-passive setup (Option A) when the question explicitly specifies a single region and automatic rerouting.
How to eliminate wrong answers
Option A is wrong because active-passive with a standby instance in a different region introduces cross-region latency and requires manual or automated failover mechanisms, not automatic rerouting within a single region. Option C is wrong because vertical scaling in a single availability zone does not provide fault tolerance; if that zone fails, all instances become unavailable regardless of size. Option D is wrong because a cold standby with daily backups involves significant recovery time and manual steps to restore service, not automatic traffic rerouting.
A company is selecting a cloud deployment model. They require the ability to keep sensitive data on-premises due to regulatory compliance, but want to leverage cloud resources for burst computing capacity. Which THREE characteristics describe this model?
Cloud bursting is a key use case for hybrid cloud.
Why this answer
Hybrid cloud connects on-premises with public cloud, enabling data residency and bursting.
A company runs a stateful application that maintains session data in memory on the server. The application experiences performance issues during traffic spikes. Which design change would best improve scalability?
Correct. Stateless design enables horizontal scaling.
Why this answer
Making the application stateless by moving session state to an external store (e.g., Redis or database) allows any instance to handle any request, enabling horizontal scaling.
A cloud engineer is designing a VPC in AWS for a three-tier web application. The web servers must be accessible from the internet, the application servers should only be accessible from the web servers, and the database servers should only be accessible from the application servers. What is the most secure VPC design?
This design isolates each tier and limits exposure, following best practices.
Why this answer
A three-tier VPC design uses public subnets for web servers (with an internet gateway) and private subnets for application and database servers, with security group rules restricting traffic between tiers.
A cloud engineer is optimizing costs for a data analytics workload that runs periodically. The workload processes large datasets stored in Amazon S3 and runs on EC2 instances. Which THREE strategies should the engineer consider to reduce costs? (Select THREE.)
Lifecycle policies reduce storage costs by moving data to cheaper tiers.
Why this answer
Using spot instances reduces compute cost for interruptible workloads. S3 lifecycle policies move old data to cheaper storage classes. Selecting the correct instance type (rightsizing) avoids overprovisioning.
A company is designing a hybrid cloud architecture. They need to ensure high availability for a critical application. Which TWO of the following are best practices for achieving high availability in a hybrid cloud environment?
Active-active provides redundancy and load distribution.
Why this answer
Using multiple availability zones within a region protects against data center failure. An active-active architecture ensures both on-premises and cloud are handling traffic, providing redundancy. Deploying in a single zone creates a single point of failure.
Using only on-premises does not leverage cloud for HA. A single load balancer is a SPOF.
A company uses AWS and Azure to run identical workloads for redundancy. They want to simplify management by using a single set of tools across both clouds. Which architectural approach should they consider?
Tools like Kubernetes or Terraform provide a consistent management layer.
Why this answer
Multi-cloud with a cloud-agnostic abstraction layer (e.g., using Terraform or Kubernetes) allows managing resources across providers with a unified toolset.
A company is using AWS and wants to minimize egress costs for data transferred out to the internet. Which strategy would be most effective?
CDN reduces egress by serving cached content from edge locations.
Why this answer
Using a CDN caches content at edge locations, reducing the amount of data transferred directly from the origin to users, thus lowering egress costs.
Which cloud deployment model involves connecting an on-premises data center to a public cloud provider using a VPN or dedicated connection?
Hybrid cloud connects on-premises and public cloud resources.
Why this answer
A hybrid cloud combines on-premises infrastructure with public cloud resources, typically connected via VPN or dedicated circuits like AWS Direct Connect or Azure ExpressRoute.
A company uses a public cloud IaaS model to host a database. They want to ensure the database remains available if an entire availability zone fails. Which configuration would provide the highest availability with automatic failover?
Synchronous replication and automatic failover protect against zone failure.
Why this answer
Option D is correct because deploying a database with a stand-by replica in a different availability zone using synchronous replication ensures that all committed transactions are written to both the primary and the stand-by before acknowledging the client. This provides automatic failover with zero data loss (RPO=0) and high availability, as the stand-by replica can immediately take over if the entire availability zone fails.
Exam trap
Cisco often tests the distinction between high availability (automatic failover within the same region) and disaster recovery (manual or automated recovery to a different region), and the trap here is that candidates confuse a read replica or cross-region snapshot with a true high-availability solution that provides automatic failover and zero data loss.
How to eliminate wrong answers
Option A is wrong because automated snapshots to a different region provide point-in-time recovery but do not enable automatic failover; the database would still be unavailable until a manual restore is performed, resulting in significant downtime. Option B is wrong because deploying multiple EC2 instances in a single availability zone does not protect against an availability zone failure; if the entire zone fails, all instances become unavailable simultaneously. Option C is wrong because a read replica in a different region with asynchronous replication is designed for read scaling and disaster recovery, not for automatic failover with high availability; asynchronous replication introduces replication lag, which can cause data loss (RPO > 0) and failover is not automatic.
A company runs a stateless web application on AWS EC2 instances behind an Application Load Balancer. The application experiences varying traffic patterns, with spikes on weekdays. The company wants to minimize costs while ensuring performance during spikes. Which combination of purchasing options and scaling strategy is most cost-effective?
Reserved instances cover predictable load, reducing cost; on-demand instances handle variable spikes.
Why this answer
Using spot instances for the baseline capacity is risky because spot instances can be interrupted, causing instability. Reserved instances provide a discount for steady-state usage, and on-demand instances handle spikes. Auto-scaling with on-demand only would be more expensive.
Spot instances for the entire workload are unreliable.
A cloud architect is designing a cost-optimized architecture for a batch processing workload that runs every hour for 10 minutes. The workload is fault-tolerant and can be interrupted. Which TWO pricing models should the architect consider to minimize costs? (Select TWO.)
On-demand offers no commitment and can be used when spot instances are not available, but it's more expensive.
Why this answer
On-demand instances (C) are correct because they allow the architect to pay only for the compute capacity used per hour, with no upfront commitment, which is ideal for a short-duration (10-minute) batch workload that runs every hour. Spot instances (D) are correct because the workload is fault-tolerant and can be interrupted, enabling the use of spare cloud capacity at significantly discounted rates (often 60-90% off on-demand), further minimizing costs for this interruptible batch processing task.
Exam trap
Cisco often tests the misconception that reserved instances or savings plans are always cheaper for any recurring workload, but the trap here is that these require long-term commitments and are cost-inefficient for short-duration, interruptible batch jobs where spot instances provide greater savings without upfront risk.
A cloud architect is designing a solution for a financial analytics application that requires consistent, low-latency block storage for a database. The database will be deployed on a virtual machine in a public cloud. Which TWO storage types are appropriate for this requirement? (Select TWO.)
Block storage provides low-latency, persistent storage for VMs.
Why this answer
Block storage (e.g., Amazon EBS, Azure Disk) is designed for low-latency, consistent performance for databases running on VMs. Instance store provides temporary block-level storage physically attached to the host, offering very low latency but is ephemeral. Object storage is not suitable for databases due to latency.
A company runs a production application on multiple cloud regions for high availability. They want to minimize latency for global users. Which DNS routing policy should they use?
Correct. Geolocation routing directs users to the closest region.
Why this answer
Geolocation routing policy directs traffic based on the user's geographic location to reduce latency.
A company wants to migrate its on-premises workloads to the cloud while maintaining the ability to run some sensitive applications on-premises. Which cloud deployment model best meets this requirement?
Hybrid cloud connects on-prem and public cloud, meeting the requirement.
Why this answer
A hybrid cloud connects on-premises infrastructure with public cloud resources, allowing workloads to run in both environments as needed.
A company needs to connect its on-premises data center to a public cloud provider with a dedicated, consistent network connection that bypasses the internet. Which connectivity method should be used?
Correct. These provide dedicated private connections.
Why this answer
Dedicated connections like AWS Direct Connect or Azure ExpressRoute provide private, consistent connectivity.
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