DP-203 Develop data processing Practice Question
You are using Azure Synapse Pipelines to perform an incremental load from Azure SQL Database to Azure Synapse Analytics. You need to identify rows that have changed since the last load. Which approach should you use?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to choose the watermark column approach (Option C) because it seems simpler, but they overlook that CDC is the only option that natively captures all DML changes (including deletes) without requiring schema modifications or custom logic to handle edge cases like out-of-order updates.
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
✓
Enable Change Data Capture (CDC) on the source table.
Change Data Capture (CDC) on the source Azure SQL Database captures insert, update, and delete operations in change tables, enabling Azure Synapse Pipelines to efficiently identify only the changed rows since the last load. This approach minimizes data movement and processing overhead compared to full or snapshot-based comparisons, making it the recommended pattern for incremental loads in Synapse Pipelines.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Compare the current data with a snapshot using T-SQL MERGE.
Why it's wrong here
Inefficient and not scalable for large datasets.
- ✗
Truncate and reload the entire table daily.
Why it's wrong here
Not incremental; uses full load.
- ✗
Use a watermark column such as LastModifiedDate.
Why it's wrong here
May miss deletions and updates that don't change the watermark.
- ✓
Enable Change Data Capture (CDC) on the source table.
Why this is correct
CDC captures all changes and supports incremental load.
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