DP-203 Design and implement data storage Practice Question
This DP-203 practice question tests your understanding of design and implement data storage. The scenario asks you to isolate a root cause — eliminate options that address a different problem before choosing. 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.
You are a data engineer at a healthcare analytics company. The company stores patient records in an Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 account organized by /patient/{patientId}/year={yyyy}/month={MM}/day={dd}/*.parquet. There are 10,000 patients, and each patient has about 1 GB of data per year. The data is used by data scientists who run ad-hoc queries using Azure Synapse Serverless SQL. They complain that queries scanning multiple patients over the last year take too long and consume too much data. They often need to filter by patientId and a date range. You need to improve query performance and reduce the amount of data scanned. You cannot change the folder structure because it is used by other processes. What should you do?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Create external tables in Synapse Serverless SQL that use the folder structure as partitions, and ensure queries filter on year, month, and day.
Option D is correct because creating external tables in Synapse Serverless SQL with the existing folder structure as partitions allows the query engine to perform partition elimination. When queries filter on year, month, and day, Synapse Serverless SQL will only scan the relevant folders, drastically reducing data scanned and improving performance. This approach does not require changing the folder structure, which is used by other processes.
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.
✗
Reorganize the folder structure to /year={yyyy}/month={MM}/day={dd}/patientId={patientId}/*.parquet.
Why it's wrong here
Changing folder structure is not allowed as per the requirement.
✗
Convert the Parquet files to CSV format to improve compression and reduce file size.
Why it's wrong here
CSV is less efficient than Parquet for analytical queries.
✗
Create views that aggregate data by patient and date, and instruct data scientists to query the views.
Why it's wrong here
Views do not automatically prune partitions unless filters are applied on partition columns.
✓
Create external tables in Synapse Serverless SQL that use the folder structure as partitions, and ensure queries filter on year, month, and day.
Why this is correct
External tables with partition elimination reduce scanned data.
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 may think views can improve performance, but in Synapse Serverless SQL, views are non-materialized and do not reduce data scanned unless the underlying data is partitioned and queries filter on partition columns.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
Synapse Serverless SQL uses a distributed query engine that can read partitioned data from Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2. By defining external tables with the folder structure as partitions (using the OPENROWSET or CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE syntax with partition columns), the engine can prune entire directories from the scan plan. This is similar to Hive-style partitioning, where the folder hierarchy maps to partition keys, enabling predicate pushdown at the storage layer.
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
A media company stores terabytes of video archives that are accessed once a year for audit purposes. Moving these objects to a cold storage tier (Azure Archive, S3 Glacier, or Google Nearline) costs a fraction of hot storage. Questions like this test whether you understand storage tiers, access frequency tradeoffs, and retrieval latency requirements.
Related glossary terms
Concepts from this question explained
These glossary pages explain the core terms tested in this DP-203 question in full detail.
Design and implement data storage — This question tests Design and implement data storage — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Create external tables in Synapse Serverless SQL that use the folder structure as partitions, and ensure queries filter on year, month, and day. — Option D is correct because creating external tables in Synapse Serverless SQL with the existing folder structure as partitions allows the query engine to perform partition elimination. When queries filter on year, month, and day, Synapse Serverless SQL will only scan the relevant folders, drastically reducing data scanned and improving performance. This approach does not require changing the folder structure, which is used by other processes.
What should I do if I get this DP-203 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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