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PCD Practice Question: Select a Google Cloud database for a global…
You need to select a Google Cloud database for a global e-commerce platform that requires strong consistency for inventory updates, but can tolerate eventual consistency for product reviews. Which THREE services would you consider appropriate for the different parts of the platform?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often mistakenly think BigQuery can serve as an operational database for storing and querying product reviews in real time, when in fact it is a data warehouse for analytics and not designed for transactional or low-latency read/write operations.
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
✓
Bigtable for real-time user behavior tracking
Bigtable is correct for real-time user behavior tracking as it is a fully managed, scalable NoSQL database designed for high-throughput, low-latency workloads, providing strong consistency for single-row operations. Firestore is suitable for product reviews because it supports eventual consistency for multi-region queries, meeting the tolerance requirement, while offering strong consistency within a single region. Cloud Spanner is ideal for inventory data because it provides global strong consistency and ACID transactions, crucial for inventory accuracy across regions.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Bigtable for real-time user behavior tracking
Why this is correct
Bigtable can handle high-throughput write/read for real-time tracking with eventual consistency.
- ✗
BigQuery for storing product reviews
Why it's wrong here
BigQuery is an analytics data warehouse, not for transactional storage of reviews.
- ✓
Firestore for product reviews
Why this is correct
Eventual consistency is acceptable; Firestore is serverless and scales for user-generated content.
- ✗
Cloud SQL for inventory
Why it's wrong here
Cloud SQL is regional, cannot provide strong consistency across global regions.
- ✓
Cloud Spanner for inventory data
Why this is correct
Strong consistency and global distribution are required for inventory.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PCD 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 PCD exam.