Google PCA Practice Question: Managing Implementation and Ensuring Solution and Operations Reliability
A team is adopting a DevOps model and wants to reduce the risk of configuration drift between environments. They deploy the same application to development, staging, and production projects on Google Cloud. Which practice should they adopt to ensure consistent, repeatable deployments across all environments?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently confuse drift detection with drift prevention, assuming that inventory or audit tools alone can keep environments consistent.
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
✓
Define infrastructure as code using Terraform with separate variable files per environment, and store the configuration in a version control system.
Repeatable deployments across environments require a declarative, versioned definition of infrastructure. Terraform with per-environment variable files lets one set of modules produce consistent resources in development, staging, and production, while version control records changes and enables review and rollback. This prevents configuration drift far more effectively than manual changes or post-hoc detection.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Manually apply changes in each project and record them in a shared spreadsheet for audit purposes.
Why it's wrong here
Manual changes and spreadsheet tracking are error-prone and do not prevent drift. Each engineer may apply slightly different settings, and the spreadsheet may not reflect the actual state. This approach increases the risk of inconsistent environments and makes rollback and auditing difficult, which is the opposite of the repeatable deployments the team needs.
- ✗
Use Cloud Console to configure each project and rely on Cloud Asset Inventory to detect differences after deployment.
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Asset Inventory can report the current state of resources, but detecting differences after manual configuration does not prevent drift. It is a detective control, not a preventive one. Relying on console changes and post-hoc comparison still leaves environments inconsistent between deployments and does not provide repeatable, versioned configuration.
- ✗
Grant all engineers Owner role on each project so they can quickly recreate resources when drift is detected.
Why it's wrong here
Broad Owner access increases the risk of unauthorized or accidental changes, which worsens drift. It also violates least privilege and complicates auditing. The ability to recreate resources manually does not ensure that the recreated state matches the intended configuration across environments, so it does not solve the consistency problem.
- ✓
Define infrastructure as code using Terraform with separate variable files per environment, and store the configuration in a version control system.
Why this is correct
Infrastructure as code with Terraform makes deployments declarative and repeatable. Separate variable files let the same modules target development, staging, and production with environment-specific values, while version control provides history, review, and rollback. This approach minimizes drift because the desired state is defined once and applied consistently.
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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 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.