Portfolio ↗

Quiz

2741 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 areas2741 Architecture Fundamentals81 Distributed Systems101 Data Architecture90 Cloud Architecture87 Networking86 API & Integration Architecture78 Reliability & Resilience99 Observability92 Performance & Capacity Engineering90 Security Architecture95 Cost Architecture & FinOps92 Business Architecture93 Architecture Communication91 Enterprise Architecture91 Legacy Modernization92 AI-Era Architecture96 Software Architecture & Engineering84 Architecture Patterns84 Architecture Decision-Making91 The Architect's Meta-Skills92 Delivery & Release Engineering93 Platform Engineering & Developer Experience92 Testing & Quality Architecture102 Data Platform Architecture98 Streaming & Real-Time Data93 Data Governance & Semantics91 Frontend & Experience Architecture91 Edge, Mobile & IoT88 Regulatory & Data Protection Architecture90 Assurance, Audit & Model Risk98
Difficulty Any beginner intermediate advanced

1018 questions.

  1. Health Checks intermediate

    A platform's health check returns 200 while the service cannot serve real traffic. What should a health check actually verify, and what should it deliberately not?

    2 min answer vercelhealth-checksreadinessliveness
  2. Health Checks intermediate Multiple choice

    Every service in a fleet exposes `/health`, and the check verifies the service can reach its database, its cache and two downstream APIs, returning 503 if any is unreachable. The shared cache has a 90-second degradation. What happens to the fleet during those 90 seconds?

    4 min answer health checkscorrelated failureload balancergraceful degradation
  3. Healthcare Data Protection intermediate Multiple choice

    An emergency department needs any clinician to reach any patient's record within seconds, while the privacy office requires minimum-necessary access. Which control set satisfies both?

    2 min answer healthcarebreak-glassrbacaudit
  4. Healthcare Data Protection intermediate Multiple choice

    At 02:40 the access-audit service behind an electronic health record starts taking 8 s per write instead of 12 ms. It returns no errors. Audit controls at 45 CFR 164.312(b) are a required implementation specification under the HIPAA Security Rule. What should the record system do while the audit path is degraded?

    3 min answer hipaaaudit-loggingfail-opengraceful-degradation
  5. Hexagonal Architecture intermediate

    A team applies hexagonal architecture and finds it adds ceremony without benefit. When does the pattern earn its cost?

    2 min answer hasurahexagonalports-adaptersabstraction
  6. Hexagonal Architecture intermediate Multiple choice

    What does hexagonal architecture give you that a conventional layered design does not?

    2 min answer hexagonalports-adapterstestingsymmetry
  7. Horizontal vs Vertical Scaling intermediate

    A service is at capacity. When is vertical scaling the better answer than horizontal, and what is the trap in each direction?

    2 min answer unacademyscalingverticalhorizontal
  8. Horizontal vs Vertical Scaling intermediate Multiple choice

    A workspace product's primary database is at its limits. Should it scale vertically, add replicas, or shard? What order and what evidence?

    2 min answer scalingverticalshardingreplicas
  9. Horizontal vs Vertical Scaling intermediate

    When is vertical scaling the better answer, and what makes horizontal inevitable eventually?

    2 min answer scalingverticalhorizontalavailability
  10. HTTP/1.1, HTTP/2 & HTTP/3 intermediate

    A platform is considering moving customer traffic to HTTP/3. What does it actually improve, for whom, and what does it complicate?

    2 min answer vercelhttp3quicmobile
  11. HTTP/1.1, HTTP/2 & HTTP/3 intermediate Multiple choice

    A team upgrades to HTTP/3 and median page load time is unchanged. Was the upgrade worthless?

    2 min answer http3quictail-latencymeasurement
  12. Human in the Loop intermediate

    A platform uses AI to propose substitutions when items are unavailable. Where should the human sit in the loop, and what determines it?

    2 min answer human-in-the-loopautonomyconfidenceescalation