Google PCA Manage implementation of cloud architecture Practice Question
A company is designing a data pipeline to ingest streaming data from IoT devices and store it in BigQuery for analysis. They need to minimize latency and operational overhead. Which two Google Cloud services should they use? (Choose two.)
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
✓
Cloud Dataflow
Cloud Pub/Sub is the recommended service for ingesting streaming data, and Cloud Dataflow can process the data and write it directly to BigQuery with low latency. Cloud Storage is for batch uploads, Cloud Functions is event-driven but not ideal for high-throughput streaming, and Cloud Dataproc is for batch processing.
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 Dataflow
Why this is correct
Cloud Dataflow can process streaming data from Pub/Sub and write to BigQuery in real time.
- ✓
Cloud Pub/Sub
Why this is correct
Cloud Pub/Sub is designed for streaming ingestion with low latency and high throughput.
- ✗
Cloud Dataproc
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Dataproc is for batch Spark/Hadoop workloads, not streaming.
- ✗
Cloud Storage
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Storage is for batch/object storage, not real-time streaming.
- ✗
Cloud Functions
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Functions can process events but is not designed for high-throughput streaming pipelines.
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Introduction to Google Cloud Platform
Key term
Dataproc
Dataproc is a managed cloud service for running Apache Spark and Apache Hadoop clusters, allowing you to process large datasets quickly and economically.
Key term
Cloud Functions
Cloud Functions are serverless compute services that let you run single-purpose code in response to events without managing servers.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PCA 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 PCA exam.