S6 - Compute & Application Design

Question 1

What are the four main compute layers?

Answer 1

IaaS (Compute Engine), CaaS (GKE), PaaS (App Engine), FaaS (Cloud Run/Functions).

Question 2

When use Compute Engine?

Answer 2

Lift-and-shift legacy apps, full OS control, custom VM tuning.

Question 3

What are Managed Instance Groups (MIGs)?

Answer 3

Groups of identical VMs with autoscaling and auto-healing.

Question 4

What’s the difference between GKE Standard and Autopilot?

Answer 4

Standard = user manages nodes; Autopilot = Google manages infrastructure.

Question 5

When to use App Engine Standard vs Flexible?

Answer 5

Standard = fully managed, scales to zero; Flexible = custom runtimes, more control.

Question 6

Cloud Run vs Cloud Functions?

Answer 6

Cloud Run = containerized services, HTTP-based; Functions = single event triggers.

Question 7

What is Anthos used for?

Answer 7

Hybrid/multi-cloud management and policy enforcement for GKE clusters.

Question 8

What are preemptible VMs?

Answer 8

Short-lived (24h max), cost-efficient VMs for batch/stateless jobs.

Question 9

How to ensure VM fleet auto-heals and scales?

Answer 9

Managed Instance Groups + health checks.

Question 10

Exam clue: “Run container without managing servers.”

Answer 10

Cloud Run.

Question 11

Exam clue: “Event-triggered automation.”

Answer 11

Cloud Functions.

Question 12

Exam clue: “Hybrid K8s across on-prem and cloud.”

Answer 12

Anthos.

Question 13

How do you lower compute costs for long-term workloads?

Answer 13

Use committed use discounts or sustained usage discounts.

Question 14

How do you lower costs for transient jobs?

Answer 14

Preemptible/spot instances.

Question 15

How do instance templates assist scaling?

Answer 15

Define uniform VM configuration for MIGs and auto-scaling policies.

Question 16

What service builds and stores container images?

Answer 16

Cloud Build + Artifact Registry.

Question 17

What service automates deployment to GKE/Run?

Answer 17

Cloud Deploy.

Question 18

Exam cue: “Autoscale containers, limit ops overhead.”

Answer 18

GKE Autopilot or Cloud Run (depending on context).

Question 19

Exam cue: “Web app with version rollouts, zero ops.”

Answer 19

App Engine Standard.

Question 20

Exam cue: “Legacy DB with full OS control.”

Answer 20

Compute Engine VM.