easyMultiple Choice
Google ACE Practice Question: A team wants logs from their Python application…
A team wants logs from their Python application running on a Compute Engine VM to appear in Cloud Logging. What must be installed on the VM?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often assume GCE VMs automatically send all logs (including application logs) to Cloud Logging, but in reality only platform-level logs are auto-streamed, and application logs require the Ops Agent.
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
✓
Ops Agent (Google Cloud's combined logging and monitoring agent)
The Ops Agent is Google Cloud's unified agent for both logging and monitoring, and it is required to stream custom application logs from a Compute Engine VM to Cloud Logging. While the VM itself sends basic platform logs (e.g., serial console output), application-level logs (e.g., from a Python app) require the Ops Agent to collect, parse, and forward them to the Cloud Logging API.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Cloud Trace SDK for the Python application
Why it's wrong here
The Cloud Trace SDK for Python instruments your application to capture distributed trace spans and latency data, which are sent to Cloud Trace for performance analysis. It does not collect or forward application log entries to Cloud Logging, and it has no concept of reading log files from disk. Using it would give you tracing insight but leave your logs unobtainable; a separate collection agent is still needed.
- ✓
Ops Agent (Google Cloud's combined logging and monitoring agent)
Why this is correct
The Ops Agent is the correct solution because it is Google Cloud's unified agent for both logging and monitoring on Compute Engine. It can be configured to collect logs from system daemons, application log files, and custom pipelines, then forward them as structured log entries to Cloud Logging, while also ingesting metrics for Cloud Monitoring. It must be explicitly installed on the VM, but it is the supported, modern replacement for the separate legacy logging and monitoring agents.
- ✗
Cloud Monitoring agent only
Why it's wrong here
The legacy Cloud Monitoring agent only collects metrics—such as CPU, memory, and disk utilization—and sends them to Cloud Monitoring; it has no capability to ingest application logs. To get logs into Cloud Logging, you would need a separate Cloud Logging agent or, ideally, the combined Ops Agent. If you deploy only the Cloud Monitoring agent, application logs remain on the VM and are never searchable in Cloud Logging, so the requirement is not met.
- ✗
No installation needed — GCE VMs automatically stream logs to Cloud Logging
Why it's wrong here
Compute Engine instances do not automatically stream application logs to Cloud Logging. By default, only platform-level logs such as VM activity, system events, and audit logs are sent by Google's services. Application logs written to files inside the VM (e.g., syslog, custom log files) require an explicitly installed and configured agent, such as the Ops Agent, to collect and forward them. There is no built-in, zero-install mechanism for application log ingestion.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
App Engine Standard vs Flexible
Key term
Google Cloud
Google Cloud is a suite of cloud computing services offered by Google that provides infrastructure, platform, and software solutions over the internet.
Key term
Cloud logging
Cloud logging is the practice of collecting, storing, and analyzing log data generated by cloud-based resources and applications to monitor performance, troubleshoot issues, and maintain security.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This ACE practice question is part of Courseiva's free Google Cloud 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 ACE exam.