Google PCA Ensure solution and operations reliability Practice Question
This PCA practice question tests your understanding of ensure solution and operations reliability. 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.
Company A runs a containerized application on Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) with 3 node pools: one for frontend, one for backend, and one for stateful databases. The backend services experience periodic latency spikes. After investigation, they found that the spikes correlate with the node pool autoscaler scaling down nodes. The backend services are deployed as Deployments with resource requests and limits set to 100m CPU and 200Mi memory each. The node pool uses n1-standard-2 machine types. The cluster autoscaler is enabled. What should they do to prevent the latency spikes?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Configure a PodDisruptionBudget for the backend Deployment with minAvailable set to a high value.
The latency spikes occur because the cluster autoscaler is terminating nodes that host backend Pods, causing those Pods to be rescheduled and disrupting traffic. A PodDisruptionBudget (PDB) with a high minAvailable value ensures that a minimum number of backend Pods remain available during voluntary disruptions like node scale-down, preventing the sudden loss of capacity that leads to latency spikes. This directly addresses the root cause without disabling autoscaling or misconfiguring scheduling.
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.
✗
Disable cluster autoscaler for the backend node pool.
Why it's wrong here
Eliminates autoscaling benefits.
✗
Use node taints and tolerations to isolate the backend services.
Why it's wrong here
Isolation does not prevent evictions.
✗
Increase the resource requests for the backend services to ensure they are scheduled on dedicated nodes.
Why it's wrong here
Does not prevent evictions during scale-down.
✓
Configure a PodDisruptionBudget for the backend Deployment with minAvailable set to a high value.
Why this is correct
Limits the number of pods that can be disrupted during voluntary disruptions.
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 confuse resource requests/limits or node isolation with disruption protection, failing to recognize that PodDisruptionBudgets are the specific Kubernetes mechanism to control voluntary disruptions like autoscaler-driven node termination.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
A PodDisruptionBudget uses the Kubernetes API to enforce a minimum number of available Pods during voluntary disruptions (e.g., node drain, cluster autoscaler scale-down). The cluster autoscaler respects PDBs by not terminating nodes that would violate the budget, thus ensuring that backend services maintain their required capacity. In practice, setting minAvailable to a value like 90% of the desired replica count prevents the autoscaler from scaling down too aggressively, while still allowing some node termination for cost optimization.
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.
Ensure solution and operations reliability — This question tests Ensure solution and operations reliability — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Configure a PodDisruptionBudget for the backend Deployment with minAvailable set to a high value. — The latency spikes occur because the cluster autoscaler is terminating nodes that host backend Pods, causing those Pods to be rescheduled and disrupting traffic. A PodDisruptionBudget (PDB) with a high minAvailable value ensures that a minimum number of backend Pods remain available during voluntary disruptions like node scale-down, preventing the sudden loss of capacity that leads to latency spikes. This directly addresses the root cause without disabling autoscaling or misconfiguring scheduling.
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.
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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