Infrastructure as Code and Configuration Management Tools DSE Practice Questions (Page 2)

Questions 6–10

1. 6application · medium

   A security team is reviewing a configuration management setup for a critical payment application. The current Ansible playbook uses a series of tasks that first stop the service, then copy the new configuration file, then start the service. The team wants to change this to a more robust approach that ensures the service ends up in the correct state regardless of the starting state. Which change best aligns with the principle of declarative idempotency?

   • AUse a shell command to restart the service only if the configuration file is different, using a checksum comparison.
   • BWrite a custom module that stops the service, writes the file, and starts the service in one atomic operation.
   • CKeep the imperative tasks but add a check at the beginning to see if the configuration file has changed, and only run the stop/start tasks if it has.
   • DReplace the tasks with a single 'service' module call that ensures the service is running and a 'template' module call that ensures the configuration file has the correct content.
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2. 7application · medium

   A small startup with a single system administrator manages a mix of 50 cloud VMs and 10 on-premises servers. The admin wants a configuration management tool that does not require installing a persistent agent on every machine and can be run on-demand from a central control node. Which tool best fits this requirement?

   • AAnsible, using SSH to connect to managed nodes and run playbooks from a control node.
   • BPuppet, using a master-agent architecture with agents installed on all nodes.
   • CChef, using a client-server model with chef-client installed on all nodes.
   • DSaltStack, using a master-minion model with minions installed on all nodes.
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4. 8expert · hard

   A team is migrating from a legacy imperative configuration management system to a declarative one. They have a complex set of scripts that install software, configure services, and manage users. They want to ensure that the new system is idempotent and can handle drift. Which approach is the most aligned with declarative configuration management?

   • AUse a mix of imperative scripts and declarative Ansible tasks, depending on the complexity of the component.
   • BUse Ansible modules to declare the desired state of each component (e.g., package, service, user) and let Ansible handle the order and idempotency.
   • CUse a custom tool that runs the scripts and checks the exit code to determine if the state is correct.
   • DTranslate the existing scripts into a series of Ansible tasks that run in the same order.
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5. 9foundation · easy

   Which of the following is a key feature of Ansible?

   • AIt uses a declarative language to define the desired state of systems
   • BIt is primarily used for provisioning cloud infrastructure, not for configuration management
   • CIt is a cloud-specific tool that only works with AWS
   • DIt requires a central server and agents on every managed node
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6. 10application · medium

   A team is migrating a legacy application to AWS. They need to provision a VPC, subnets, EC2 instances, and an RDS database. They want to use a tool that is tightly integrated with AWS and allows them to define the entire stack as a single template. Which tool is the most appropriate choice for this specific requirement?

   • AAWS CloudFormation, using a YAML or JSON template to define the entire stack.
   • BAnsible, using playbooks to create the VPC, subnets, and EC2 instances.
   • CPuppet, using manifests to define the AWS resources.
   • DTerraform, using the AWS provider to define all resources in a .tf file.
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