PCDE Practice Question: Manage a solution that can span multiple database technologies
You notice that your Cloud SQL for MySQL instance's storage is filling up quickly. You have enabled automatic storage increase, but you want to manually increase the storage size by 50 GB to avoid any risk of reaching the limit. The current disk size is 200 GB. What is the correct gcloud command to resize the disk?
⚠ Common exam trap
Google often tests the exact syntax of gcloud commands, specifically that the `--storage-size` flag takes a plain integer (no 'GB' suffix) and that `patch` is the correct subcommand for modifying an existing instance, not `update` or `resize`.
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
✓
gcloud sql instances patch my-instance --storage-size 250
The `gcloud sql instances patch` command is used to modify an existing Cloud SQL instance, and the `--storage-size` flag expects the value in GB as an integer (without the 'GB' suffix). Specifying `250` correctly increases the storage from 200 GB to 250 GB.
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 sql instances patch my-instance --storage-size 250GB
Why it's wrong here
The size should be specified without 'GB' suffix; the unit is GB by default. Correct syntax is --storage-size=250.
- ✓
gcloud sql instances patch my-instance --storage-size 250
Why this is correct
This increases the disk to 250 GB. The command is valid and disk resize is online.
- ✗
gcloud sql instances update my-instance --storage-size 250
Why it's wrong here
The correct command is 'patch', not 'update'.
- ✗
gcloud sql instances resize my-instance 250
Why it's wrong here
There is no 'resize' subcommand; the correct command is 'patch' with --storage-size.
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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.