PDE Ingesting and Processing the Data Practice Question
Your team uses dbt to transform data in BigQuery. You need to schedule dbt runs to refresh materialized tables and views every hour. The transformations include both full refreshes and incremental models. What is the most efficient way to orchestrate these dbt runs on Google Cloud?
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 Cloud Composer (Airflow) to schedule and run dbt commands.
Cloud Composer (Airflow) is the recommended orchestration tool for complex workflows like dbt runs, supporting dependencies, retries, and scheduling. Cloud Scheduler alone cannot run dbt directly; it can trigger a Cloud Function to run dbt, but that is less maintainable. Cloud Build is CI/CD, not scheduling. Using a cron job on Compute Engine is possible but not managed.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Use Cloud Composer (Airflow) to schedule and run dbt commands.
Why this is correct
Cloud Composer is managed Airflow, ideal for scheduling and orchestrating dbt runs with dependencies.
- ✗
Use Cloud Build with a trigger to run dbt every hour.
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Build is for CI/CD pipelines, not for scheduled recurring jobs with dependencies.
- ✗
Use Cloud Scheduler to trigger a Cloud Function that runs dbt.
Why it's wrong here
This works but is less scalable and maintainable than Cloud Composer for complex dbt workflows with incremental models.
- ✗
Set up a cron job on a Compute Engine instance to run dbt.
Why it's wrong here
This is not managed and requires maintenance; it does not scale well.
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This PDE 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 PDE exam.