AZ-304 Azure Data Storage Architecture 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which Azure Cosmos DB consistency level provides the strongest consistency guarantee at the cost of higher read latency?
- Eventual
- Consistent Prefix
- Session
- Strong (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Strong
Strong consistency ensures that reads always return the most recent committed write, but it requires synchronous replication across all regions, increasing read latency.
Question 2: What is the purpose of Azure SQL Elastic Pools?
- To replicate databases across multiple regions
- To share compute resources across multiple databases with variable workloads (Correct answer)
- To automatically shard a single database horizontally
- To provide serverless compute scaling
Correct answer: To share compute resources across multiple databases with variable workloads
Elastic Pools allow multiple databases to share a common pool of eDTUs or vCores, optimizing cost when individual databases have unpredictable or varying usage patterns.
Question 3: Which Azure Storage feature allows you to define rules that automatically transition blobs to cooler tiers or delete them based on last-modified or last-accessed time?
- Storage Access Policies
- Lifecycle Management Policies (Correct answer)
- Object Replication
- Blob Versioning
Correct answer: Lifecycle Management Policies
Lifecycle Management Policies in Azure Blob Storage automate tiering and deletion of blobs based on age or last access time, reducing storage costs without manual intervention.
Question 4: An architect needs a fully managed, serverless SQL data warehouse service for analytical workloads. Which Azure service is most appropriate?
- Azure SQL Database
- Azure Synapse Analytics (serverless SQL pool) (Correct answer)
- Azure SQL Managed Instance
- Azure Database for PostgreSQL Hyperscale
Correct answer: Azure Synapse Analytics (serverless SQL pool)
Azure Synapse Analytics serverless SQL pool allows querying data in Azure Data Lake using T-SQL without provisioning infrastructure, paying only per TB processed.
Question 5: Which Azure Cosmos DB partition key selection principle is most important for achieving optimal throughput distribution?
- Use a partition key with few unique values
- Use a partition key with high cardinality that evenly distributes data (Correct answer)
- Use the creation timestamp as the partition key
- Use a partition key that matches the primary sort order
Correct answer: Use a partition key with high cardinality that evenly distributes data
A high-cardinality partition key that distributes requests and data evenly across logical partitions prevents hot partitions and maximizes provisioned throughput utilization.
Question 6: You need to enforce that all data written to an Azure Storage account is encrypted with customer-managed keys stored in Azure Key Vault. What must you configure?
- Azure Defender for Storage
- Customer-Managed Keys (CMK) with Key Vault integration (Correct answer)
- Double encryption infrastructure layer
- Storage Service Encryption with Microsoft-managed keys
Correct answer: Customer-Managed Keys (CMK) with Key Vault integration
Customer-Managed Keys (CMK) allow you to control the encryption key lifecycle in Azure Key Vault, satisfying compliance requirements for bring-your-own-key (BYOK) encryption.
AZ-304 Azure Data Storage Architecture 2
Which Azure Cosmos DB consistency level provides the strongest consistency guarantee at the cost of higher read latency?