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Quiz

2667 questions of the kind that actually get asked — in interviews, in architecture review boards, and by the person who has to run the thing at 3 AM. Every answer states the trade-off rather than the slogan, and says when the obvious choice is the wrong one.

All areas2667 Architecture Fundamentals81 Distributed Systems101 Data Architecture90 Cloud Architecture87 Networking86 API & Integration Architecture78 Reliability & Resilience88 Observability81 Performance & Capacity Engineering90 Security Architecture95 Cost Architecture & FinOps92 Business Architecture93 Architecture Communication91 Enterprise Architecture91 Legacy Modernization92 AI-Era Architecture86 Software Architecture & Engineering84 Architecture Patterns84 Architecture Decision-Making91 The Architect's Meta-Skills92 Delivery & Release Engineering93 Platform Engineering & Developer Experience92 Testing & Quality Architecture90 Data Platform Architecture88 Streaming & Real-Time Data93 Data Governance & Semantics81 Frontend & Experience Architecture91 Edge, Mobile & IoT88 Regulatory & Data Protection Architecture90 Assurance, Audit & Model Risk88
Difficulty Any beginner intermediate advanced

45 questions in Enterprise Architecture.

  1. Paved Roads intermediate

    How does a paved road achieve governance outcomes without a mandate, and what makes it fail?

    2 min answer paved-roadgovernanceadoptiondefaults
  2. Platform Teams intermediate

    A platform team is overwhelmed by requests and product teams complain about waiting. What does the boundary between them need to change?

    2 min answer platform-teamsself-serviceboundaryrequests
  3. Platform Teams intermediate Multiple choice

    A platform team of 9 serving 300 engineers changes model. It stops publishing modules and libraries that teams run themselves and starts operating the runtime: it owns the clusters, the pipelines and the base images, and it holds the pager for them. Within two quarters the share of services on the supported path goes from 60% to 95% and a runtime upgrade that used to take three quarters takes five weeks. What has the organisation given up?

    3 min answer platform-teamsteam-topologieson-callcognitive-load
  4. Platform Teams intermediate

    When should an organisation create a platform team, and what distinguishes one from a service desk?

    2 min answer platformself-servicecognitive-loadbottleneck
  5. Reference Architectures intermediate

    An enterprise publishes reference architectures that teams do not follow. What makes a reference architecture get used?

    2 min answer reference-architectureadoptioninstantiationdecisions
  6. Reference Architectures intermediate

    An organisation publishes reference architectures that teams do not follow. What is the failure, and what would work?

    2 min answer chargebeereference-architecturepaved-roadadoption
  7. Reference Architectures intermediate

    Three teams followed the published reference architecture exactly. All three produced the same defect - unbounded retry behaviour against a shared dependency - and two of them caused incidents. The reference architecture is not being ignored. Diagnose.

    3 min answer reference-architecturedefaultsretriesgovernance
  8. Reference Architectures intermediate

    You published a reference architecture. Teams are not following it. What is likely wrong?

    2 min answer eastandardsadoption
  9. Architecture Roadmaps intermediate

    An architecture roadmap covering three years is invalidated within six months by a change in product direction. How should roadmaps be built under uncertainty?

    2 min answer roadmapuncertaintyoptionssequencing
  10. Technology Architecture intermediate Multiple choice

    A language runtime used by 180 of 240 services leaves vendor support in 14 months. Services are owned by 40 teams with their own roadmaps, and the upgrade is mostly mechanical but breaks in about 15% of cases. Which approach gets the estate upgraded?

    3 min answer lifecycleend-of-lifemigrationfunding
  11. Technology Architecture intermediate

    An organisation's technology choices from five years ago now constrain its options. How should technology lifecycle be managed rather than discovered?

    2 min answer elasticlifecycledeprecationupgrade
  12. Technology Architecture intermediate

    How would you decide which technologies in an estate need attention first?

    2 min answer obsolescencelifecycleriskstandards