Chapter 2 of 4 · Google Cloud Associate Cloud Engineer

Planning and implementing a cloud solution

Compute Engine, GKE, serverless, storage and data products, VPC networking, load balancing and IaC.

  • 9topics
  • 38 minfast track
  • 5diagrams and exhibits
  • 30%of the exam
Start with Choosing Compute and Launching VMs

Topics in this chapter

Take them in order, or jump to the one you need.

  1. 1Choosing Compute and Launching VMsChoosing Compute Engine, GKE, Cloud Run, Cloud Run functions or Agent Runtime, launching VMs with availability policies and SSH…Diagram5 min
  2. 2Managed Instance Groups, OS Login and VM ManagerInstance templates and autoscaled managed instance groups, OS Login, VM Manager patching and inventory, Spot VMs and custom…Diagram4 min
  3. 3Deploying to GKEInstalling kubectl, GKE Autopilot versus Standard, regional and private clusters, getting credentials and deploying a…4 min
  4. 4Serverless and Event-Driven DeploymentsDeploying to Cloud Run and Cloud Run functions, and processing Pub/Sub, Cloud Storage and other Google Cloud events with…Diagram4 min
  5. 5Choosing Data and Storage ProductsChoosing Cloud SQL, AlloyDB, Spanner, Bigtable, Firestore, BigQuery, Memorystore, Pub/Sub, Kafka, Filestore and Cloud Storage…4 min
  6. 6Loading Data and Multi-Region RedundancyLoading data with gcloud storage, bq load from Cloud Storage and Storage Transfer Service, and keeping multi-region redundancy…4 min
  7. 7VPCs, Subnets and FirewallsCustom mode VPCs and subnets, Shared VPC, VPC Network Peering, VPC firewall rules and Cloud NGFW policies with tags, secure tags…Diagram5 min
  8. 8Connectivity, Load Balancers and Network TiersCloud VPN, Cloud Interconnect and VPC Network Peering, choosing Google Cloud load balancers, and the difference between Premium…Diagram4 min
  9. 9Infrastructure as Code and AI-Assisted ToolsInfrastructure as Code with Terraform, Config Connector, Helm and Fabric FAST, plus Gemini CLI, Antigravity, Cloud Assist and App…4 min

About this chapter

What this chapter covers

This is where solutions get built, and it is worth about 30 percent of the exam. It covers compute resources (choosing compute, launching VMs, disks, managed instance groups, OS Login, VM Manager, Spot VMs, GKE, serverless and event processing, GPUs and TPUs), storage and data solutions (data products, storage products and classes, loading data, multi-region redundancy), networking (VPCs, subnets, firewall rules and Cloud NGFW, connectivity, load balancers, Network Service Tiers) and tooling (Infrastructure as Code and AI-assisted tools).

How the topics fit together

ComputeVMs, GKE, serverlessDatadatabases, storage, loadingNetworkVPC, firewalls, load balancingAutomateTerraform, Config Connector, Gemini
  • Choosing compute and launching VMs covers the compute options, instance settings, disks and accelerators.
  • Managed instance groups, OS Login and VM Manager covers templates, autoscaling, OS Login, VM Manager, Spot VMs and custom machine types.
  • Deploying to GKE covers kubectl, Autopilot, regional and private clusters, and deploying apps.
  • Serverless and event-driven deployments covers Cloud Run, Cloud Run functions, Eventarc and event sources.
  • Choosing data and storage products covers databases, analytics, messaging, file storage and Cloud Storage classes.
  • Loading data and multi-region redundancy covers uploads, loading into BigQuery, Storage Transfer Service and redundancy.
  • VPCs, subnets and firewalls covers custom VPCs, Shared VPC, peering, firewall rules and Cloud NGFW policies.
  • Connectivity, load balancers and network tiers covers VPN, Interconnect, load balancer choice and Network Service Tiers.
  • Infrastructure as Code and AI-assisted tools covers Terraform, Config Connector, Helm, Fabric FAST and Gemini tools.
Exam tip

The exam often asks for the option with the least operational overhead that still meets the requirement. Managed and serverless options usually win unless a requirement rules them out.

How to use these pages

Each topic page has the same shape, so you can skim for what you need.

  • What it is: the idea in plain words.
  • How it works: the mechanism, with examples, commands and tables.
  • What to remember for the exam: the facts to memorise and how questions are phrased.
  • Common mistakes: the classic traps.
  • Check yourself: three questions to test your understanding.

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