DP-300 Configure and manage automation of tasks Practice Question
You need to automate the monitoring of Azure SQL Database performance and receive alerts when certain conditions are met. Which TWO Azure services can be used together to achieve this?
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
✓
Log Analytics Workspace
Log Analytics Workspace (B) is correct because it is the service that stores and queries the diagnostic and metric telemetry collected from Azure SQL Database, enabling you to write Kusto Query Language (KQL) queries that define the performance conditions to monitor. Azure Monitor Alerts (C) is correct because it evaluates those log/metric queries against defined thresholds and triggers notifications (for example, email, SMS, or action groups) when the conditions are met. Together, Log Analytics Workspace provides the data and query layer while Azure Monitor Alerts provides the rule evaluation and notification layer, forming the standard automated monitoring and alerting pipeline for Azure SQL Database. Azure Sentinel (A) is a SIEM/SOAR tool focused on security threat detection, not general SQL performance monitoring. Application Insights (D) targets application-level telemetry (APM) for web apps and services, not Azure SQL Database performance metrics. Azure Advisor (E) only provides best-practice recommendations and does not perform real-time condition-based alerting.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Azure Sentinel
Why it's wrong here
Azure Sentinel is a SIEM for security analytics and threat detection, ingesting logs for incident investigation rather than database performance metrics. It is tempting because it ingests telemetry and alerts, but its alerts target security events, not SQL performance conditions.
- ✓
Log Analytics Workspace
Why this is correct
Log Analytics stores and queries the diagnostic and metric data collected from Azure SQL Database. It supplies the log store that alert rules evaluate, satisfying the requirement for a queryable repository underpinning automated performance monitoring and alerting.
- ✓
Azure Monitor Alerts
Why this is correct
Azure Monitor Alerts supplies the threshold-based evaluation engine, firing notifications when metrics such as DTU consumption or query duration breach defined conditions. Combined with Azure SQL Database's native metric emission, it satisfies the requirement to receive automated alerts, without needing custom polling code or third-party tooling.
- ✗
Application Insights
Why it's wrong here
Application Insights monitors application-level telemetry and request performance, not Azure SQL Database platform metrics. It is tempting for instrumented application code, but database performance monitoring and metric-based alerting require Azure Monitor and its alert rules instead.
- ✗
Azure Advisor
Why it's wrong here
Azure Advisor provides best-practise recommendations from configuration analysis; it neither collects live performance metrics nor raises condition-based alerts. It is tempting as a monitoring-adjacent service, but it is advisory only, so it cannot automate metric monitoring or alerting.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Securing Data at Rest and in Transit
Key term
Azure SQL Performance Tuning
Azure SQL Performance Tuning is the process of optimizing the speed and efficiency of queries and database operations in Microsoft Azure SQL Database or SQL Managed Instance to reduce latency and improve throughput.
Key term
Azure SQL Threat Detection
Azure SQL Threat Detection is a built-in security feature that continuously monitors your Azure SQL database for suspicious activities and sends alerts when potential threats are found.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DP-300 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-300 exam.