Cloud Computing & Infrastructure Flashcards

In cloud FinOps, what does 'rightsizing' mean?

Answer: Matching instance types and sizes to actual workload requirements to eliminate over-provisioning

Rightsizing analyzes actual CPU, memory, and I/O utilization to recommend smaller or different instance types, directly reducing cloud spend.

Which cloud storage type provides block-level storage that functions like a traditional hard drive, typically attached to a single virtual machine?

Answer: Block storage (EBS-style)

Block storage presents raw storage volumes to a VM; the OS formats and mounts them like a local disk, making it ideal for databases and boot volumes.

An organization adopts a 'lift and shift' cloud migration strategy. What does this entail?

Answer: Moving existing applications to the cloud with minimal or no modification

Lift and shift (rehosting) migrates workloads to cloud VMs with little re-architecture, enabling fast migration at the cost of limited cloud-native optimization.

Which cloud security principle states that every user, service, and device must be continuously verified and granted only the minimum access required?

Answer: Zero Trust Architecture

Zero Trust Architecture assumes no implicit trust based on network location; it requires continuous authentication, authorization, and encryption for every access request.

What is the primary advantage of deploying an application across multiple Availability Zones (AZs) within a single cloud region?

Answer: High availability and fault tolerance against a single data center failure

Multiple AZs provide physical isolation within a region so that hardware, power, or networking failures in one AZ do not impact the application in others.

In a DevOps CI/CD pipeline for cloud deployments, what is the role of an artifact repository (e.g., container registry)?

Answer: To store versioned build outputs such as container images for deployment

An artifact repository stores immutable, versioned build outputs (e.g., Docker images) so deployment stages pull a known-good artifact rather than rebuilding from source.

Which cloud observability pillar provides a time-ordered record of discrete events such as errors, warnings, and informational messages from applications and infrastructure?

Answer: Logs

Logs capture timestamped event records that describe what happened within a system, enabling post-incident root cause analysis and compliance auditing.