PCDE Practice Question: Manage a solution that can span multiple database technologies
A database administrator wants to set up monitoring and alerting for Cloud SQL instances. They need to be notified when CPU utilisation exceeds 80% for more than 5 minutes and when replication lag on a read replica exceeds 30 seconds. Which two metrics should they create alerting policies for? (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
✓
cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/replication/replica_lag
Cloud SQL provides the metric 'cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/cpu/utilization' for CPU usage and 'cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/replication/replica_lag' for replication lag. Alerting policies can be set on these metrics in Cloud Monitoring.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/network/received_bytes_count
Why it's wrong here
Network bytes are not directly relevant.
- ✗
cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/disk/bytes_used
Why it's wrong here
Disk usage is separate; not relevant for CPU alert.
- ✓
cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/replication/replica_lag
Why this is correct
This metric measures replication lag in seconds.
- ✓
cloudsql.googleapis.com/database/cpu/utilization
Why this is correct
This metric tracks CPU usage percentage.
- ✗
agent.googleapis.com/cpu_usage
Why it's wrong here
This is a generic agent metric, not specific to Cloud SQL.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PCDE 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 PCDE exam.