PCDOE Implementing service monitoring strategies Practice Question
A DevOps engineer notices that some Compute Engine instances are not reporting metrics to Cloud Monitoring. Which two potential causes should they investigate? (Choose two.)
⚠ Common exam trap
Google Cloud often tests the misconception that preemptible instances have a built-in metric reporting cutoff, when in fact they can report metrics normally until they are preempted, and the real issue is often IAM permissions or missing agent installation.
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
✓
The instances have insufficient IAM permissions to write metrics.
Compute Engine instances require the appropriate IAM permissions (e.g., roles/monitoring.metricWriter) to write metrics to Cloud Monitoring. Without these permissions, the API calls to ingest metric data are denied, even if the Ops Agent is installed and running.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
The instances are in a different region and Cloud Monitoring doesn't support cross-region.
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Monitoring supports all GCP regions globally.
- ✗
The instances are preemptible and automatically stop reporting after 24 hours.
Why it's wrong here
Preemptible instances report metrics while running, with no 24-hour limit.
- ✓
The instances have insufficient IAM permissions to write metrics.
Why this is correct
Instances need the roles/monitoring.metricWriter role to send metrics.
- ✗
The instances are in a different project and not peered.
Why it's wrong here
Cross-project monitoring is supported through metrics scopes without peering.
- ✓
The Ops Agent is not installed on the instances.
Why this is correct
The Ops Agent is required to collect and send system metrics to Cloud Monitoring.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PCDOE 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 PCDOE exam.