Google ACE Practice Question: Ensuring Successful Operation of a Cloud Solution
You need to perform a rolling update of a GKE deployment and ensure that during the update, the new pods are ready before terminating the old ones. You have already set the update strategy to RollingUpdate. Which kubectl command sequence should you use to update the image and monitor the rollout?
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
✓
kubectl set image deployment/myapp myapp=gcr.io/myproject/myapp:v2; kubectl rollout status deployment/myapp
kubectl set image updates the image; kubectl rollout status monitors the progress. If the rollout fails, kubectl rollout undo rolls back.
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 container clusters upgrade my-cluster; kubectl get deployments
Why it's wrong here
This command upgrades the GKE cluster's control plane and node pools, not the application Deployment object. It is the wrong tool because it changes Kubernetes infrastructure version rather than updating myapp's container image. Plus, kubectl get deployments only lists Deployment state; it doesn't modify or verify a rollout. To update the Deployment's image you need kubectl set image or kubectl patch, not a cluster upgrade.
- ✓
kubectl set image deployment/myapp myapp=gcr.io/myproject/myapp:v2; kubectl rollout status deployment/myapp
Why this is correct
kubectl set image updates the Deployment's pod template to gcr.io/myproject/myapp:v2, which triggers the Deployment controller to create a new ReplicaSet and incrementally replace old pods while respecting maxSurge/maxUnavailable. kubectl rollout status then blocks until the new ReplicaSet becomes ready and the old ReplicaSet is scaled down, confirming the rolling update completed successfully. This is the standard declarative workflow for updating an app version.
- ✗
kubectl edit deployment myapp; kubectl get pods; kubectl delete pod old-pod
Why it's wrong here
kubectl edit may apply a change to the Deployment, but then you attempt to manually delete an old pod. Deleting a pod directly does not perform a controlled rolling update; the ReplicaSet will immediately recreate it from the current pod template, which could cause downtime and bypasses the Deployment's rolling update strategy. Manual pod deletion also doesn't wait for health checks or provide automated progress inspection, so it is unreliable for version updates.
- ✗
kubectl apply -f deployment.yaml; kubectl rollout undo deployment/myapp
Why it's wrong here
kubectl apply -f can update the Deployment if the YAML contains a new template, but running kubectl rollout undo immediately after would revert the Deployment to the previous ReplicaSet, canceling the intended v2 rollout. This combination contradicts the desired outcome: apply starts a change, then undo rolls it back. Moreover, if the YAML lacks changes, apply will do nothing and undo would need a previous revision, so this pair is not a valid rolling update procedure.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Deployment Manager and Terraform on GCP
Key term
GKE
GKE is Google's managed Kubernetes service that automates deploying, scaling, and managing containerized applications in the cloud.
Key term
Image
An image is a complete snapshot of a system's operating system, applications, and settings, used to deploy or restore computing environments quickly.
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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.