PCDOE Implementing service monitoring strategies Practice Question
An SRE team needs to implement an incident management workflow that automatically creates a ticket in their ITSM tool when a critical alert fires. They use Cloud Monitoring. Which approach should they use?
⚠ Common exam trap
Google Cloud often tests the misconception that direct webhooks (Option B) are sufficient for ITSM integration, but they ignore that Cloud Monitoring webhooks lack support for custom headers, authentication, and reliable retry mechanisms required by enterprise ITSM tools.
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
✓
Use a Cloud Pub/Sub notification channel and a Cloud Function that receives the alert and calls the ITSM API.
Cloud Monitoring can send alert notifications to a Cloud Pub/Sub topic, which then triggers a Cloud Function. The Cloud Function can parse the alert payload and call the ITSM tool's API to create a ticket, providing a reliable, scalable, and decoupled integration that supports custom logic and error handling.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Configure the alerting policy to send notifications via email to the ITSM system's email-to-ticket feature.
Why it's wrong here
Email is unreliable for critical alerts and may have delays or filtering issues.
- ✗
Create a webhook notification channel directly to the ITSM tool.
Why it's wrong here
Webhooks are less reliable without retry logic; Pub/Sub is preferred for production.
- ✓
Use a Cloud Pub/Sub notification channel and a Cloud Function that receives the alert and calls the ITSM API.
Why this is correct
Pub/Sub ensures reliable delivery, and Cloud Function can transform and forward alerts to the ITSM tool.
- ✗
Use the Cloud Monitoring API to periodically pull alerts and create tickets.
Why it's wrong here
Polling introduces latency and complexity; event-driven approaches are better.
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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.