Google ACE Practice Question: Ensuring Successful Operation of a Cloud Solution

Answer analysis

Option-by-option breakdown

For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.

• ✗

  gcloud compute instance-groups set-autoscaling

  Why it's wrong here

  The `gcloud compute instance-groups set-autoscaling` command targets unmanaged or managed instance groups in Compute Engine, not the node-pool abstraction that GKE exposes. Each GKE node pool does have an underlying managed instance group (MIG), but modifying that MIG directly bypasses GKE's cluster autoscaler synchronization and can lead to inconsistent scaling behavior or cluster misconfiguration. It is the wrong tool because GKE node pools are managed and controlled through the container API, not the raw compute API.

• ✗

  kubectl autoscale node-pool

  Why it's wrong here

  `kubectl autoscale` is used to create a HorizontalPodAutoscaler for Kubernetes workloads such as Deployments or ReplicaSets, and it does not accept a 'node-pool' resource type. Node pools are GKE infrastructure objects that are not represented as Kubernetes API resources, so kubectl has no native mechanism to modify their autoscaling configuration. The correct approach is to use a GKE-specific gcloud command, as kubectl operates inside the cluster rather than on the cluster's node infrastructure.

• ✗

  gcloud container clusters update

  Why it's wrong here

  The `gcloud container clusters update` command modifies cluster-wide settings such as add-ons, network policy, or binary authorization, but autoscaling is a per-node-pool attribute. Enabling autoscaling on an individual node pool requires targeting that specific pool via `gcloud container node-pools update`. A cluster-level update does not have a flag for node-pool autoscaling and would not apply the desired configuration to any existing node pool.

• ✓

  gcloud container node-pools update --enable-autoscaling

  Why this is correct

  This is the correct command because GKE exposes node-pool-level autoscaling through the container API. Running `gcloud container node-pools update NODE_POOL --cluster=CLUSTER --enable-autoscaling --min-nodes=MIN --max-nodes=MAX` turns on the cluster autoscaler for that specific node pool, allowing GKE to add or remove nodes within the configured limits based on resource demand. The command can also be used later to adjust min/max limits or disable autoscaling on existing node pools.

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