Azure Infrastructure Basics* - mjaffry01/Archinterview GitHub Wiki
MCQ 1
Which of the following best describes an Azure Region? A. A single data center B. A physical office of Microsoft C. A set of data centers deployed within a specific geographic area D. A virtual machine instance β Answer: C π Explanation: Azure Region is a set of data centers deployed within a specific geographic area, connected through a low-latency network.
MCQ 2
What is the purpose of Azure Availability Zones? A. To store backups only B. To isolate failures and provide high availability C. To reduce billing costs D. To monitor network performance β Answer: B π Explanation: Availability Zones are physically separate locations within a region, used to ensure high availability and fault isolation.
MCQ 3
How many Availability Zones must a region have at minimum to support zone-redundant services? A. 1 B. 2 C. 3 D. 5 β Answer: C π Explanation: A region must have at least 3 Availability Zones to support zone-redundant services.
MCQ 4
What is the primary difference between an Availability Set and an Availability Zone? A. Availability Set spans multiple regions B. Availability Zone spans a single data center C. Availability Set is within a single data center; Availability Zone spans multiple data centers D. No difference β Answer: C π Explanation: Availability Sets group VMs within a single data center; Availability Zones span multiple data centers.
MCQ 5
Which component ensures low-latency access in Azureβs architecture? A. Virtual Machines B. Load Balancers C. Proximity Placement Groups D. Virtual Networks β Answer: C π Explanation: Proximity Placement Groups reduce latency by placing resources physically close within the same data center.
MCQ 6
Which of the following is part of Microsoftβs responsibility in the shared responsibility model? A. Customer data B. Guest OS C. Physical hosts and networking D. Application logic β Answer: C π Explanation: Microsoft is responsible for physical infrastructure including hosts and networking.
MCQ 7
Which of the following is NOT a customer responsibility in the shared responsibility model for IaaS? A. Virtual machines B. Operating system updates C. Physical data center D. Network configurations β Answer: C π Explanation: Microsoft manages the physical data centers. Customers manage VMs, OS, and configurations in IaaS.
MCQ 8
What Azure feature allows you to replicate applications across different regions for disaster recovery? A. Resource Groups B. Azure Site Recovery C. Availability Sets D. Azure Monitor β Answer: B π Explanation: Azure Site Recovery enables business continuity by replicating apps across regions.
MCQ 9
What does Azure Traffic Manager primarily help with? A. Managing virtual networks B. Routing user traffic across regions C. Monitoring CPU usage D. Deploying resources β Answer: B π Explanation: Azure Traffic Manager routes incoming traffic based on policies across regions for performance and availability.
MCQ 10
What is the benefit of deploying VMs in an Availability Set? A. Reduced billing B. Automatic scaling C. Increased uptime via fault and update domains D. Data encryption β Answer: C π Explanation: Availability Sets ensure VMs are distributed across fault and update domains to increase availability.
MCQ 11
Which of these improves resilience by distributing instances across physically separate locations? A. Load Balancer B. Availability Set C. Proximity Placement Group D. Availability Zone β Answer: D π Explanation: Availability Zones are physically separated and used to increase resiliency.
MCQ 12
What is a fault domain in Azure? A. A set of VMs that perform the same function B. A grouping of hardware that shares a common power source C. A type of subscription D. A billing container β Answer: B π Explanation: A fault domain shares a power source and network switch and isolates hardware failure.
MCQ 13
Which Azure architecture concept is best used for grouping related resources across locations? A. Virtual Network B. Availability Set C. Resource Group D. Availability Zone β Answer: C π Explanation: Resource Groups are used to manage and group related Azure resources.
MCQ 14
How does Azure ensure compliance with data residency laws globally? A. Using VPNs B. By offering multiple global regions C. By encrypting all data D. By enabling audit logs β Answer: B π Explanation: Azure operates regions globally to allow customers to choose data residency locations.
MCQ 15
Which service should be used for global load balancing in Azure? A. Azure Load Balancer B. Azure Traffic Manager C. Application Gateway D. ExpressRoute β Answer: B π Explanation: Azure Traffic Manager performs DNS-based global load balancing.
MCQ 16
Which Azure component provides a logical isolation for deployed resources? A. Availability Set B. Subscription C. Availability Zone D. Virtual Machine β Answer: B π Explanation: An Azure Subscription provides logical isolation and resource boundary for billing and access control.
MCQ 17
How does Azure reduce latency for globally distributed users? A. By enabling caching in virtual machines B. By storing all data in one location C. Through its global data center network D. By compressing application data β Answer: C π Explanation: Azureβs global data centers reduce latency by serving users from nearest regions.
MCQ 18
What Azure feature automatically manages the failover of applications across regions? A. Azure Monitor B. Azure Traffic Manager C. Azure Key Vault D. Azure Security Center β Answer: B π Explanation: Azure Traffic Manager helps with failover routing across different regions.
MCQ 19
Which is a core goal of Azureβs regional architecture? A. Reduce pricing B. Increase marketing C. Ensure high availability and redundancy D. Provide licensing benefits β Answer: C π Explanation: Azure regions are built to ensure redundancy and high availability.
MCQ 20
What is the minimum recommended number of VMs in an availability set for SLA benefits? A. 1 B. 2 C. 3 D. 5 β Answer: B π Explanation: At least two VMs are required in an Availability Set to qualify for SLA.
Mastering Azure Infrastructure: Concepts and Interview Insights
This guide delivers a comprehensive and refined overview of core Azure infrastructure components. Each section is designed to deepen your understanding of Microsoft Azure's global architectureβmaking it ideal for interviews, practical deployment scenarios, and certification preparation.
Azure Regions
Definition: An Azure Region is a collection of data centers deployed within a specific geographic area. These regions are interconnected and strategically located to support data residency, compliance requirements, high availability, and low-latency access.
Availability Zones
Definition: Availability Zones are distinct physical locations within an Azure Region. Each zone contains one or more data centers equipped with independent power, cooling, and networking. Deploying applications across multiple zones enhances fault tolerance and ensures high availability.
Availability Sets
Definition: Availability Sets protect applications from data center-level failures by distributing VMs across multiple fault and update domains within a single data center. This setup reduces the likelihood of simultaneous downtime due to hardware failures or planned maintenance.
Fault Domains and Update Domains
Definition:
Fault Domain: A group of hardware with a shared power source and network switch. Distributing VMs across fault domains minimizes the impact of hardware failures.
Update Domain: A logical group of VMs that undergo maintenance (such as OS updates) at the same time. Azure rotates updates across these domains to ensure service continuity.
Proximity Placement Groups
Definition: Proximity Placement Groups (PPGs) reduce latency by ensuring that interdependent Azure resources are physically located close to one another. This is especially beneficial for applications with strict latency requirements such as high-frequency trading or gaming.
Shared Responsibility Model
Definition: Azure's security and operations responsibilities are shared between Microsoft and the customer:
Microsoft: Responsible for the physical infrastructure (data centers, networking, hardware, and hypervisors).
Customer: Responsible for data, identities, configurations, applications, and OS-level updates (extent varies with IaaS, PaaS, SaaS).
Azure Site Recovery
Definition: Azure Site Recovery (ASR) is a disaster recovery solution that replicates workloads across Azure regions or from on-premises to Azure. It ensures business continuity by enabling automated failover and failback with minimal downtime.
Azure Traffic Manager
Definition: Azure Traffic Manager is a DNS-based traffic load balancer that distributes user traffic across multiple endpoints based on performance, geographic location, or availability. It supports automatic failover and ensures globally distributed applications remain responsive.
Resource Groups
Definition: A Resource Group is a logical container that holds related Azure resources. It simplifies management, monitoring, access control, and lifecycle organization for services and components that share the same application or project scope.
Data Residency and Compliance
Definition: Azure offers more than 60 global regions, enabling customers to select where their data is stored. This flexibility helps businesses comply with data sovereignty regulations and ensures that sensitive data remains within legal jurisdictions.
Azure Subscriptions
Definition: An Azure Subscription defines boundaries for resource usage, billing, and access control. It enables logical isolation between departments, projects, or environments and is key to organizing large-scale enterprise deployments.
Service Level Agreements (SLAs)
Definition: Microsoft Azure provides SLAs to guarantee service availability. For example, deploying at least two VMs in an Availability Set qualifies for a 99.95% uptime SLA, mitigating potential downtime from hardware failures or maintenance events.