DA0-002 Data Acquisition and Preparation Practice Question
A retail company's data analytics team needs to acquire point-of-sale (POS) transaction data from 200 stores daily. Each store sends a CSV file via email at the end of the day. The files often arrive late, have inconsistent column names (e.g., "StoreID", "Store_ID", "store_id"), and occasionally contain corrupted rows. The team manually processes these files, leading to frequent errors and delays. The company wants to automate the acquisition process to ensure data is available by 9 AM the next business day with high quality. Which approach best addresses these issues?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often choose Option C or D because they seem more 'modern' or 'direct,' but they fail to recognize that the question specifically requires handling existing CSV files and late arrivals, which a script-based ETL approach (Option A) directly solves without requiring stores to change their behavior or infrastructure.
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
✓
Create a script to automatically download email attachments, validate and standardize columns, and flag corrupted rows for review
It directly addresses all three issues: automating the retrieval of email attachments (handling late arrivals), standardizing inconsistent column names via a script (e.g., mapping 'StoreID', 'Store_ID', 'store_id' to a canonical schema), and implementing validation logic to flag corrupted rows for manual review. This approach ensures data is processed reliably by 9 AM without manual intervention, meeting the automation and quality requirements.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Create a script to automatically download email attachments, validate and standardize columns, and flag corrupted rows for review
Why this is correct
This automates the entire process, handles inconsistencies, and ensures timely availability with quality checks.
- ✗
Hire a data entry contractor to manually check and re-enter data
Why it's wrong here
Manual entry is still error-prone, slow, and not scalable, and does not meet the automation goal.
- ✗
Ask stores to use a standardized web form to enter data directly into a cloud database
Why it's wrong here
While this would standardize input, it requires store staff to change their workflow and may face adoption issues.
- ✗
Implement a VPN so stores can connect to the central database and write transactions in real time
Why it's wrong here
Real-time writing may cause network issues and does not address existing file format or corruption problems.
Go deeper
Related to this question
About these practice questions
Courseiva writes every DA0-002 question from scratch — 986 in total, each with an explanation and a wrong-answer breakdown. None are copied from real exams or 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 DA0-002 practice question is part of Courseiva's free CompTIA 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 DA0-002 exam.