1. As a consulting architect, you have been asked to help improve the reliability of a distributed system with a large number of custom microservices and dependencies on third-party APIs running in a hybrid cloud architecture. You have decided that at this level of complexity, you can learn more by experimenting with the system than by studying documents and code listings. So, you start by randomly shutting down servers and simulating network partitions. This is an example of what practice?

2. As a developer, you write code in your local environment, and after testing it, you commit it or write it to a version control system. From there it is automatically incorporated with the baseline version of code in the repository. What is the process called?

3. You have just been hired as a cloud architect for a large financial institution with global reach. The company is highly regulated, but it has a reputation for being able to manage IT projects well. What practices would you expect to find in use at the enterprise level that you might not find at a startup?

4. A CTO of a midsize company hires you to consult on the company’s IT practices. During preliminary interviews, you realize that the company does not have a business continuity plan. What would you recommend they develop first with regards to business continuity?

5. As a consulting architect, you have been asked to help improve the reliability of a distributed system with a large number of custom microservices and dependencies on third-party APIs running in a hybrid cloud architecture. You have decided that at this level of complexity, you can learn more by experimenting with the system than by studying documents and code listings. So, you start by randomly shutting down servers and simulating network partitions. This is an example of what practice?

6. A software engineer asks for an explanation of the difference between business continuity planning and DR planning. What would you say is the difference?

7. An engineer is on call for any service-related issues with a service. In the middle of the night, the engineer receives a notification that a set of APIs is returning HTTP 500 error codes to most requests. What kind of documentation would the engineer turn to first?

8. A minor problem repeatedly occurs with several instances of an application that causes a slight increase in the rate of errors returned. Users who retry the operation usually succeed on the second or third attempt. By your company’s standards, this is considered a minor incident. Should you investigate this problem?

9. Business decision-makers have created a budget for software development over the next three months. There are more projects proposed than can be funded. What measure might the decision-makers use to choose projects to fund?

10. A CTO of a midsize company hires you to consult on the company’s IT practices. During preliminary interviews, you realize that the company does not have a business continuity plan. What would you recommend they develop first with regards to business continuity?

11. There has been a security breach at your company. A malicious actor outside of your company has gained access to one of your services and was able to capture data that was passed into the service from clients. Analysis of the incident finds that a developer included a private key in a configuration file that was uploaded to a version control repository. The repository is protected by several defensive measures, including role-based access controls and network-level controls that require VPN access to reach the repository. As part of backup procedures, the repository is backed up to a cloud storage service. The folder that stores the backup was mistakenly granted public access privileges for up to three weeks before the error was detected and corrected. During the post-mortem analysis of this incident, one of the objectives should be to

12. A team of early career software engineers has been paired with an architect to work on a new software development project. The engineers are anxious to get started coding, but the architect objects to that course of action because there has been insufficient work prior to development. What steps should be completed before beginning development according to SDLC?

13. A team of developers is working on a backend service to implement a new business process. They are debating whether to use arrays, lists, or hash maps. In what stage of the SDLC are these developers at present?

14. In an analysis meeting, a business executive asks about research into COTS. What is this executive asking about?

15. You have just been hired as a cloud architect for a large financial institution with global reach. The company is highly regulated, but it has a reputation for being able to manage IT projects well. What practices would you expect to find in use at the enterprise level that you might not find at a startup?