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Quiz

179 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 areas179 Architecture Fundamentals5 Distributed Systems26 Data Architecture23 Cloud Architecture19 Networking17 API & Integration Architecture13 Reliability & Resilience9 Observability8 Performance & Capacity Engineering6 Security Architecture16 Cost Architecture & FinOps4 Business Architecture2 Architecture Communication3 Enterprise Architecture2 Legacy Modernization3 AI-Era Architecture3 Software Architecture & Engineering3 Architecture Patterns6 Architecture Decision-Making9 The Architect's Meta-Skills2
Difficulty Any beginner intermediate advanced

179 questions.

  1. Technical Leadership advanced

    You are the first architect at a 200-engineer company with no architecture function. What do you do in the first three months?

    3 min answer leadershipinfluenceassessmentgovernance
  2. Technology Selection advanced

    Three teams have independently chosen three different message brokers. Design the selection and governance process going forward.

    2 min answer technology-selectiongovernancepaved-roadstandards
  3. Threat Modelling advanced

    Run a threat model on a new payment integration: our service calls a third-party payment provider and receives webhooks. Where are the interesting threats?

    2 min answer threat-modellingstridewebhookspayments
  4. Timeouts & Deadlines intermediate

    A service becomes unresponsive during an incident in a dependency it barely uses. Investigation finds the client had no read timeout. Explain the full mechanism.

    2 min answer timeoutspoolscascading-failure
  5. Timeouts & Deadlines advanced

    Design the timeout configuration for a request that passes through gateway, orders, pricing and inventory. What numbers, and what rule generates them?

    2 min answer timeoutsdeadlinescascadingretries
  6. TLS & Certificates intermediate

    A partner reports your API fails from their servers with a certificate error. It works in every browser you try and from your laptop. Diagnose and prevent.

    1 min answer tlschainincidentmonitoring
  7. Tokens & JWTs advanced

    Your JWT-based auth means a fired employee keeps access for 15 minutes after their account is disabled. Security says that is unacceptable. What are the options?

    2 min answer jwtrevocationtokenstradeoffs
  8. VPC Design intermediate

    You are designing the network for a platform expected to run for a decade, spanning multiple regions, with acquisitions likely. What do you decide on day one and why?

    2 min answer vpccidrtransit-gatewayplanning
  9. Webhooks advanced

    Design a webhook delivery system for a platform with 10,000 customers. What are the hard parts?

    2 min answer webhooksdeliverysecurityretries
  10. WebSockets & Realtime advanced

    A dashboard product uses WebSockets for live updates. It works at 5,000 concurrent users and falls apart at 50,000. Diagnose the architectural issues.

    2 min answer websocketsssebackplanefan-out
  11. Zero Trust advanced

    A board mandate says "implement zero trust in twelve months". What do you actually do, in what order?

    2 min answer zero-trustsequencingpragmatism