Google ACE Practice Question: Ensuring Successful Operation of a Cloud Solution
You are deploying a new version of a microservice to Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE). You want to minimize downtime and ensure that traffic is only routed to pods that are ready to serve requests. Which TWO actions should you take? (Choose two.)
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is focusing on liveness probes or restart policies, which handle container restarts but do not control traffic routing during deployments.
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
✓
Configure a readiness probe for the pods.
To minimize downtime during a deployment, you need both a readiness probe and a rolling update strategy. Readiness probes ensure that only pods that are ready to serve traffic are added to the Service's endpoints, while rolling updates gradually replace old pods with new ones, maintaining availability. Together, they prevent traffic from reaching unready pods and ensure a smooth transition.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Configure a readiness probe for the pods.
Why this is correct
A readiness probe determines whether a pod is ready to accept traffic. When a pod fails the readiness probe, it is removed from the Service's endpoints, preventing traffic from being routed to it. This ensures that only healthy pods receive requests, which is essential for zero-downtime deployments and maintaining service availability during updates.
- ✗
Configure a liveness probe for the pods.
Why it's wrong here
A liveness probe checks if a pod is still running; if it fails, the pod is restarted. While important for recovering from deadlocks, it does not control traffic routing. A pod that is alive but not ready would still receive traffic if no readiness probe is configured, potentially causing errors. Therefore, liveness alone does not ensure traffic goes only to ready pods.
- ✗
Expose the deployment using a LoadBalancer service.
Why it's wrong here
A LoadBalancer service provides external access to the application, but it does not control pod readiness or update strategy. It simply routes traffic to the Service's endpoints. Without proper readiness probes and a rolling update strategy, the load balancer might send traffic to pods that are not ready, causing errors. Therefore, this action alone does not ensure zero-downtime deployments.
- ✗
Set the pod's restartPolicy to Always.
Why it's wrong here
restartPolicy Always is the default for pods in a Deployment and ensures that containers are restarted if they exit. However, it does not affect traffic routing or readiness. Even with Always, a pod might be running but not ready to serve requests; without a readiness probe, it could still receive traffic prematurely. Thus, it does not directly contribute to minimizing downtime during deployment.
- ✓
Use a rolling update strategy with maxSurge and maxUnavailable.
Why this is correct
A rolling update strategy gradually replaces old pods with new ones, ensuring that some pods remain available throughout the process. By setting maxSurge and maxUnavailable, you control the number of extra and unavailable pods during the update. This minimizes downtime and allows new pods to become ready before old ones are terminated, which is critical for a smooth deployment.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Google Cloud Platform Overview
Key term
Google Kubernetes Engine
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) is a managed Kubernetes service on Google Cloud that lets you deploy, scale, and manage containerized applications without having to operate the underlying cluster control plane.
Key term
Availability
Availability is the measure of how often a system or service is operational and accessible when needed, typically expressed as a percentage of uptime.
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JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Google Cloud exam blueprint
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.