Google PCA Manage and provision cloud infrastructure Practice Question
This PCA practice question tests your understanding of manage and provision cloud infrastructure. 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 wants to migrate an on-premises Oracle database to Google Cloud. They need high availability and want to minimize application changes. Which service should they use?
Clue words in this question
Noticing these words before you look at the options changes how you read each choice.
Clue: "minimum / minimize"
Why it matters: Asks for the least resource use — fewest addresses, smallest subnet, lowest overhead. Eliminate over-provisioned options even if they would technically work.
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Bare Metal Solution
Bare Metal Solution is correct because it provides dedicated physical servers for Oracle workloads, enabling high availability through Oracle RAC or Data Guard while preserving the existing Oracle database architecture. This minimizes application changes since the database remains Oracle-native, unlike managed services that require migration to a different database engine.
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.
✗
Cloud SQL for MySQL
Why it's wrong here
Cloud SQL does not support Oracle databases.
✓
Bare Metal Solution
Why this is correct
Bare Metal Solution offers dedicated Oracle-optimized hardware with minimal application changes.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "minimum / minimize" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
Cloud Spanner
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Spanner is a globally distributed database and would require significant schema changes.
✗
Compute Engine with Oracle license
Why it's wrong here
Compute Engine requires manual configuration for HA and licensing, increasing complexity.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is that candidates often choose Compute Engine with Oracle license (Option D) thinking it is the most flexible, but they overlook the high-availability requirement and the operational overhead of manually configuring Oracle RAC or Data Guard, which Bare Metal Solution simplifies with a managed infrastructure.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
Bare Metal Solution offers dedicated servers with direct-attached storage and low-latency networking, supporting Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) for automatic failover and load balancing. It also integrates with Google Cloud services like VPC and Cloud Interconnect, allowing hybrid deployments while maintaining Oracle licensing flexibility. In a real-world scenario, a financial firm migrating a critical Oracle OLTP system would use Bare Metal Solution to avoid rewriting PL/SQL stored procedures and maintain existing backup scripts.
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 PCA question in full detail.
Manage and provision cloud infrastructure — This question tests Manage and provision cloud infrastructure — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Bare Metal Solution — Bare Metal Solution is correct because it provides dedicated physical servers for Oracle workloads, enabling high availability through Oracle RAC or Data Guard while preserving the existing Oracle database architecture. This minimizes application changes since the database remains Oracle-native, unlike managed services that require migration to a different database engine.
What should I do if I get this PCA question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
Are there clue words in this question I should notice?
Yes — watch for: "minimum / minimize". Asks for the least resource use — fewest addresses, smallest subnet, lowest overhead. Eliminate over-provisioned options even if they would technically work.
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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