DP-203 Design and implement data storage Practice Question
Your company has an Azure Synapse Analytics dedicated SQL pool. You need to implement a solution that automatically moves data between the 'PRIMARY' filegroup and a secondary filegroup based on data age, without manual intervention. Which feature should you use?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often confuse data movement between filegroups with storage tiering or external data access, leading them to choose PolyBase or Azure Data Lake Storage tiering instead of recognizing that partition switching is the native mechanism for intra-database data relocation in Synapse dedicated SQL pools.
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
✓
Partition switching
Partition switching in Azure Synapse Analytics dedicated SQL pool allows you to efficiently move data between filegroups by switching partitions between tables. By aligning partitions with data age, you can automatically transfer older data to a secondary filegroup without manual intervention, using a scheduled process like a stored procedure or Azure Data Factory.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Materialized views
Why it's wrong here
Materialized views improve query performance but do not move data between filegroups.
- ✗
Azure Data Lake Storage tiering
Why it's wrong here
Data Lake Storage tiering is for storage tiers, not filegroup management within a dedicated SQL pool.
- ✗
PolyBase
Why it's wrong here
PolyBase is used for querying external data, not for moving data between filegroups.
- ✓
Partition switching
Why this is correct
Partition switching enables efficient data movement between partitions, which can be automated with partition management.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Introduction to Azure Data Engineering
Key term
Azure Data Factory
Azure Data Factory is a cloud-based data integration service that lets you create, schedule, and orchestrate data pipelines to move and transform data from various sources to destinations.
Key term
Azure Synapse Analytics
Azure Synapse Analytics is a cloud-based data integration, warehousing, and analytics service that brings together big data and data warehouse capabilities under one platform.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DP-203 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Microsoft certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the DP-203 exam.