mediummultiple choiceObjective-mapped

A social networking application uses Azure Cosmos DB to store user posts. When a user publishes a new post, they immediately refresh their feed and expect to see their own post. However, the application can tolerate temporary staleness for posts from other users (e.g., a few seconds delay). Which Azure Cosmos DB consistency level should the application use for read operations that display the feed?

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A social networking application uses Azure Cosmos DB to store user posts. When a user publishes a new post, they immediately refresh their feed and expect to see their own post. However, the application can tolerate temporary staleness for posts from other users (e.g., a few seconds delay). Which Azure Cosmos DB consistency level should the application use for read operations that display the feed?

Answer choices

Why each option matters

Good practice is not just finding the correct option. The wrong answers often show the exact trap the exam wants you to fall into.

A

Distractor review

Strong

Strong consistency guarantees linearizability (reads always see the latest write globally), but this introduces higher latency and is more expensive. It is overkill for this requirement where only the writer needs immediate consistency.

B

Distractor review

Bounded staleness

Bounded staleness allows reads to lag behind writes by a configurable time interval or number of versions. While it could work, it is a stricter guarantee than needed (the application only needs session-level consistency) and may have higher latency than session consistency.

C

Best answer

Session

Session consistency uses a session token to ensure that within the same client session, reads reflect the writes made by that client. This satisfies the requirement that the user sees their own post immediately, while other reads may see slightly stale data.

D

Distractor review

Eventual

Eventual consistency does not guarantee that a user will read their own write immediately. There could be a delay, so the user might not see their own post right after publishing, which breaks the requirement.

Common exam trap

Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword

Many certification questions include familiar terms but test a specific constraint. Read the exact wording before choosing an answer that is generally true but wrong for this case.

Technical deep dive

How to think about this question

This question should be treated as a scenario, not a definition check. Identify the problem, the constraint and the best action. Then compare each option against those facts.

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.
  • Use explanations to understand the rule behind the answer.

TExam Day Tips

  • Underline the problem statement mentally.
  • 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.

Related practice questions

Related DP-900 practice-question pages

Use these pages to review the topic behind this question. This is how one missed question becomes focused revision.

More questions from this exam

Keep practising from the same exam bank, or move into a focused topic page if this question exposed a weak area.

Question 1

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Question 2

A data engineer needs to query data stored in CSV files in Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 using T-SQL in Azure Synapse Analytics, without loading the data into the database. Which feature should they use?

Question 3

A data engineer needs to process raw clickstream data from multiple websites that is stored in Azure Blob Storage as JSON files. The processing must run automatically every hour, transform the data into a structured format for reporting, and handle schema changes in the source data without manual intervention. Which Azure service should be used?

Question 4

A data engineer is designing a data lake architecture in Azure. They plan to first ingest raw data from various sources into a landing zone in Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2. Then they will clean, validate, and deduplicate that data in a second zone. Finally, they will create aggregated, business-ready datasets in a third zone for analysts. This layered approach is known as which architecture?

Question 5

A data engineer needs to transform large datasets stored in Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 using Python and Apache Spark. They want a serverless compute option that automatically scales and requires no cluster management. Which Azure service should they use?

Question 6

A company collects customer feedback forms. Each form contains always-present fields like CustomerID and SubmissionDate, but also a free-text Comments field and optional fields like Rating or ProductCategory that vary between forms. How should this data be classified?

FAQ

Questions learners often ask

What does this DP-900 question test?

Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.

What is the correct answer to this question?

The correct answer is: Session — Session consistency guarantees that a single client session (identified by a session token) reads its own writes and sees monotonic reads. This ensures the user who posted will immediately see their own post in their feed. Other users reading from different sessions may see slightly stale data, which is acceptable for this scenario. Strong consistency would guarantee global reads of writes but with higher latency and cost. Bounded staleness could work but is stricter than needed. Eventual consistency does not guarantee reads of own writes within the same session.

What should I do if I get this DP-900 question wrong?

Then try more questions from the same exam bank and focus on understanding why the wrong options are tempting.

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