Google ACE Planning and configuring a cloud solution Practice Question
This ACE practice question tests your understanding of planning and configuring a cloud solution. Read the scenario carefully and evaluate each option against the stated constraints before committing to an answer. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
A company uses Cloud CDN to accelerate content delivery. They notice that some requests are not being cached, despite the cache-control headers being set correctly. The origin is a Compute Engine instance behind an HTTP load balancer. What is a likely cause?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
The origin returns a Set-Cookie header, which prevents caching by default.
Cloud CDN will not cache responses that include a Set-Cookie header by default, even if Cache-Control headers are correctly set. This is because Set-Cookie indicates user-specific or session-specific content, and caching it could lead to serving private data to other users. The origin (Compute Engine behind an HTTPload balancer) returning Set-Cookie effectively disables caching for those responses.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
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 cache key includes the query string, causing too many variations.
Why it's wrong here
That would reduce cache hit ratio, not prevent caching entirely.
✗
The load balancer is using HTTP/2, which disables caching.
The origin returns a Set-Cookie header, which prevents caching by default.
Why this is correct
Set-Cookie headers make Cloud CDN skip caching by default.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is that candidates often focus on cache-control headers or query strings, but Cisco tests the less obvious behavior that Set-Cookie headers implicitly prevent caching in Cloud CDN, even when other caching directives appear correct.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
Under the hood, Cloud CDN respects the HTTP/1.1 caching rules defined in RFC 7234, which state that a response with a Set-Cookie header is considered non-cacheable unless explicitly overridden by a Cache-Control directive like 'public'. In practice, many applications inadvertently send session cookies even for static assets, causing unexpected cache misses. A real-world scenario is a web application that sets a session cookie on every request; without stripping Set-Cookie for cacheable resources, Cloud CDN will bypass the cache entirely.
KKey Concepts to Remember
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
TExam Day Tips
→Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
→Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
An e-commerce site experiences heavy traffic on Black Friday and near-zero traffic during off-peak weeks. Rather than provisioning permanent large VMs, the team uses auto-scaling groups that add capacity automatically under load and reduce it overnight. Questions like this test whether you understand elasticity, availability zones, and cloud compute scaling patterns.
Related glossary terms
Concepts from this question explained
These glossary pages explain the core terms tested in this ACE question in full detail.
Planning and configuring a cloud solution — This question tests Planning and configuring a cloud solution — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: The origin returns a Set-Cookie header, which prevents caching by default. — Cloud CDN will not cache responses that include a Set-Cookie header by default, even if Cache-Control headers are correctly set. This is because Set-Cookie indicates user-specific or session-specific content, and caching it could lead to serving private data to other users. The origin (Compute Engine behind an HTTP load balancer) returning Set-Cookie effectively disables caching for those responses.
What should I do if I get this ACE question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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Question Discussion
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