Google Cloud (GCP)

You can provision resources, navigate the Google Cloud Console, and manage IAM project hierarchies safely from the command line.

1. What cloud computing is: IaaS, PaaS and SaaS90 min
   • Shared responsibility model
   • Infrastructure vs Platform services
   • Cloud economics and OPEX vs CAPEX
2. Google Cloud global infrastructure: regions and zones90 min
   • Low-latency fiber backbone
   • Multi-region vs single-region design
   • Fault isolation domains
3. The resource hierarchy: organization, folders and projects2 hrs
   • Resource Manager API
   • Inheritance of access policies
   • Project naming and quota management
4. Billing, the free tier and quotas2 hrs
   • Billing alerts and programmatic notifications
   • Committed use discounts
   • Managing API rate limits and soft quotas
5. The Google Cloud Console, gcloud CLI, Cloud Shell and the Architecture Framework3 hrs
   • gcloud config initialisation
   • Cloud Shell ephemeral environment
   • Well-Architected pillars on GCP

Hands-on project: Set up a new Google Cloud organization hierarchy with folders, assign granular IAM roles to group accounts, and verify billing budgets using gcloud CLI.

You can enforce the principle of least privilege using custom roles, service accounts, and secure Workload Identity federation.

1. Cloud IAM: members, roles and policies90 min
   • Binding structure in JSON
   • Principals: users, service accounts, groups
   • Policy inheritance paths
2. Basic, predefined and custom roles90 min
   • Auditing basic viewer/editor roles
   • Creating granular custom roles via gcloud
   • Role permission evaluation logic
3. Service accounts and Workload Identity2 hrs
   • Service account key rotation policies
   • Short-lived credentials via impersonation
   • Workload Identity federation with external providers
4. Cloud Identity and organization policies90 min
   • Enforcing domain-restricted sharing
   • Constraint enforcement across folder hierarchies
   • Disabling external public IP creation by policy
5. IAM best practices and least privilege90 min
   • Recommender API for IAM tightening
   • Troubleshooting access denied errors with policy troubleshooter
   • Routine access reviews

Hands-on project: Create a least-privilege custom IAM role for a staging environment, attach a constrained service account to a VM, and audit policy bindings.

You can launch, resize, secure, and autoscale virtual machines behind a managed global load balancer.

1. Compute Engine VM instances, images and machine types2 hrs
   • Custom machine types and memory configuration
   • Preemptible and Spot VMs for cost savings
   • OS image selection and custom golden images
2. SSH access, firewall rules and connecting to VMs90 min
   • OS Login configuration
   • IAP (Identity-Aware Proxy) tunnel access
   • Target tags and network firewall priorities
3. Persistent disks, snapshots and storage90 min
   • Standard persistent vs balanced vs SSD disks
   • Automated snapshot schedules
   • Resizing live production disks
4. Cloud Load Balancing2 hrs
   • Global external HTTP(S) load balancing
   • Backend services and health checks
   • SSL certificate provisioning and maps
5. Managed Instance Groups and autoscaling3 hrs
   • Stateless vs stateful MIGs
   • Autoscaling based on CPU utilization and HTTP request rates
   • Rolling updates and instance repair policies

Hands-on project: Deploy a high-availability web tier using a Managed Instance Group, frontend HTTP(S) load balancer, and custom startup scripts.

You can design secure object storage buckets, enforce lifecycle transition rules, and mount shared network filesystems.

1. Cloud Storage buckets, objects and storage classes2 hrs
   • Standard, Nearline, Coldline, and Archive classes
   • Uniform vs fine-grained bucket access control
   • Multipart uploads and parallel composite uploads
2. Security, versioning, lifecycle policies and signed URLs2 hrs
   • Object versioning and soft delete configurations
   • Lifecycle rules for automatic tiering and deletion
   • Generating time-limited signed URLs for secure downloads
3. Static website hosting on Cloud Storage90 min
   • Configuring index and error pages
   • Domain mapping with HTTPS load balancers
   • CORS configuration for frontend integration
4. Persistent Disks and Filestore90 min
   • Attaching Filestore (NFS) to multiple compute instances
   • Local SSD performance tuning
   • Disk encryption with Cloud KMS keys
5. Archive storage, backups and data transfer90 min
   • Storage Transfer Service for migrating external data
   • Disaster recovery backup strategies
   • Audit logging for data access visibility

Hands-on project: Configure a multi-region Cloud Storage bucket with object versioning, customer-managed encryption keys, and automated lifecycle archiving to Nearline/Coldline.

You can design global custom VPCs, route private traffic securely, and set up hybrid cloud connectivity.

1. VPC networks (global) and subnets2 hrs
   • Custom vs Auto subnet mode VPCs
   • IP address management and secondary ranges
   • Shared VPC setup across projects
2. Firewall rules, routes and Cloud NAT2 hrs
   • Ingress and egress rule evaluation order
   • Custom static routes and next hops
   • Cloud NAT gateway scaling and port allocation
3. Cloud DNS and private DNS zones90 min
   • Managed public zones and record types
   • Private DNS zones for internal service discovery
   • DNS peering and forwarding configurations
4. Cloud CDN, Cloud Armor and VPC peering2 hrs
   • Caching static assets at edge locations
   • Cloud Armor security policies and rate limiting
   • VPC Network Peering vs Serverless VPC Access
5. Hybrid connectivity: Cloud VPN and Interconnect90 min
   • High-availability IPsec VPN tunnels
   • Dedicated Interconnect vs Partner Interconnect
   • BGP routing sessions and dynamic route exchange

Hands-on project: Provision a custom VPC with public and private subnets, configure Cloud NAT for outbound internet access, and establish a private DNS zone.

You can deploy, scale, and secure managed relational and NoSQL databases with high availability.

1. Cloud SQL: MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQL Server2 hrs
   • Instance sizing and vertical scaling
   • Read replicas for read-heavy workloads
   • Private IP connection via VPC service controls
2. Cloud Spanner for globally distributed relational data90 min
   • Horizontal scaling with ACID guarantees
   • Multi-region instance configuration
   • Schema design and split points
3. Firestore and Datastore for NoSQL90 min
   • Document data model and collections
   • Indexing and compound queries
   • Datastore vs Firestore native mode
4. Memorystore (Redis) and Bigtable2 hrs
   • Memorystore for Redis caching layers
   • Bigtable architecture for high-throughput time-series data
   • Column family design patterns
5. Backups, replication and database security90 min
   • Point-in-time recovery (PITR)
   • Database encryption keys managed by KMS
   • IAM database authentication

Hands-on project: Deploy a Cloud SQL PostgreSQL instance with high-availability replicas, private IP connection, and automated backup schedules.

You can build and deploy event-driven serverless functions and containerised microservices with automatic scaling to zero.

1. Serverless concepts on Google Cloud90 min
   • Scale-to-zero economics
   • Cold start mitigation techniques
   • Event-driven architecture patterns
2. Cloud Functions and event triggers2 hrs
   • HTTP triggers vs background event triggers
   • Connecting Cloud Functions to VPC networks
   • Error handling and retry policies
3. Cloud Run for serverless containers3 hrs
   • Deploying arbitrary containers as serverless services
   • Traffic splitting across revisions
   • Configuring CPU allocation and memory limits
4. App Engine for web applications90 min
   • Standard environment vs Flexible environment
   • app.yaml configuration and dispatch rules
   • Managing app versions and rollbacks
5. Eventarc, Workflows and event-driven patterns90 min
   • Routing events via Eventarc and Pub/Sub
   • Orchestrating multi-step workflows with Cloud Workflows
   • Handling asynchronous state machines

Hands-on project: Containerise a Node.js REST API, deploy it to Cloud Run with environment secrets, and trigger serverless functions on Cloud Storage uploads.

You can build container images, manage secure registries, and run production workloads on Google Kubernetes Engine.

1. Containers on Google Cloud90 min
   • Container runtime architecture
   • Container security principles
   • Base image selection and vulnerability scanning
2. Artifact Registry and Container Registry90 min
   • Setting up multi-region repositories
   • IAM permissions for pushing and pulling images
   • Vulnerability insights integration
3. Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) fundamentals2 hrs
   • Standard vs Autopilot clusters
   • Control plane management and upgrades
   • Node pools and machine types
4. Deploying, scaling and managing workloads on GKE3 hrs
   • Pods, ReplicaSets, and Deployments
   • Cluster IP, NodePort, and LoadBalancer services
   • Persistent volumes with GCE persistent disk CSI drivers
5. GKE Autopilot and Cloud Run for containers90 min
   • Managed infrastructure in Autopilot mode
   • Cost comparison between GKE Standard and Autopilot
   • Choosing between GKE and Cloud Run

Hands-on project: Deploy a multi-tier microservices application on GKE using Kubernetes Deployments, Services, Ingress, and horizontal pod autoscalers.

You can query petabyte-scale datasets using BigQuery and process real-time event streams with Pub/Sub.

1. Why Google Cloud leads on data and analytics90 min
   • Separation of storage and compute
   • Serverless data processing architecture
   • Enterprise data warehousing evolution
2. BigQuery: the serverless data warehouse and SQL analytics2 hrs
   • Partitioned and clustered tables
   • Cost control via slot reservations and query limits
   • Machine learning models directly inside SQL (BigQuery ML)
3. Pub/Sub for messaging and streaming90 min
   • Topics, subscriptions, and message delivery guarantees
   • Push vs pull subscriber models
   • Dead letter queues and retry policies
4. Dataflow and Dataproc overview90 min
   • Apache Beam model in Cloud Dataflow
   • Managed Spark and Hadoop clusters with Dataproc
   • ETL pipeline orchestration
5. An introduction to Vertex AI and ML on Google Cloud90 min
   • Vertex AI Workbench notebooks
   • Training and deploying custom models
   • Consuming pre-built AI APIs

Hands-on project: Ingest streaming events via Pub/Sub, process them with Dataflow, and run complex analytical SQL queries in BigQuery.

You can configure centralized observability dashboards, log sinks, alert policies, and robust secret management.

1. Cloud Monitoring: metrics, alerts and dashboards2 hrs
   • Custom metric ingestion and MQL queries
   • Alerting policies and notification channels
   • Uptime checks and SLO/SLI tracking
2. Cloud Logging, Cloud Trace and Error Reporting2 hrs
   • Log sinks, exclusions, and exporting to BigQuery
   • Distributed tracing across microservices
   • Analyzing exception stack traces in Error Reporting
3. Cloud KMS and Secret Manager90 min
   • Customer-managed encryption keys (CMEK)
   • Hardware security modules (HSM)
   • Storing and rotating secrets securely in Secret Manager
4. Cloud Armor and Security Command Center90 min
   • WAF rules and geo-based access control
   • Mitigating DDoS attacks
   • Threat detection in Security Command Center
5. Cost management, budgets and optimization90 min
   • Cloud Billing export to BigQuery
   • Recommender service cost findings
   • Budget alerts and automated shutdown scripts

Hands-on project: Set up Cloud Monitoring dashboards, custom uptime checks, alerting policies connected to Slack/PagerDuty, and secret injection via Secret Manager.

You can provision and manage cloud infrastructure repeatably using Terraform and automated CI/CD pipelines.

1. Infrastructure as Code with Terraform on Google Cloud2 hrs
   • Google provider configuration
   • Managing remote state in Cloud Storage
   • Terraform modules for reusable architecture patterns
2. Deployment Manager and Config Connector90 min
   • Native templates with Deployment Manager
   • Managing GCP resources via Kubernetes custom resources (Config Connector)
   • Declarative state reconciliation
3. CI/CD with Cloud Build and Cloud Deploy2 hrs
   • cloudbuild.yaml pipeline syntax
   • Integrating GitHub repository triggers
   • Continuous delivery promotions with Cloud Deploy
4. Decoupling with Pub/Sub and Cloud Tasks90 min
   • Asynchronous task queues
   • Rate-limiting background job processing
   • Event-driven decoupling patterns
5. High availability and disaster recovery90 min
   • Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and Recovery Time Objective (RTO)
   • Cross-region replication strategies
   • Disaster recovery testing procedures

Hands-on project: Write modular Terraform code to provision a complete multi-tier GCP architecture and deploy application updates using Cloud Build.

You can successfully tackle Google Cloud certification exams by mastering question patterns, architecture domains, and testing strategies.

1. Google Cloud certification paths and how to choose90 min
   • Associate vs Professional vs Expertise certifications
   • Prerequisites and recertification requirements
   • Mapping exams to career goals
2. Associate Cloud Engineer and Professional Cloud Architect focus2 hrs
   • Core operational tasks for Associate level
   • Enterprise design patterns for Architect level
   • Analyzing case study questions
3. Exam structure, domains and question patterns90 min
   • Multiple-choice vs multi-select strategies
   • Distractor elimination techniques
   • Time management during the exam
4. Practice tests and exam strategy2 hrs
   • Simulated exam environments
   • Reviewing missed questions and underlying concepts
   • Exam booking and online proctoring guidelines
5. Hands-on review of frequently tested services90 min
   • IAM permission troubleshooting scenarios
   • Network routing and VPC peering trick questions
   • Storage class selection criteria

Hands-on project: Complete timed practice exams for Associate Cloud Engineer and Professional Cloud Architect, reviewing detailed remediation reports.

You can design, build, test, secure, and present a complete, production-grade cloud architecture on Google Cloud from scratch.

1. Design a scalable, secure and cost-aware architecture on GCP3 hrs
   • Translating business requirements into cloud specs
   • Security hardening and network isolation design
   • Cost estimation and optimization review
2. Build it: VPC, compute, storage, database and IAM4 hrs
   • Executing Terraform apply for core infrastructure
   • Validating network connectivity and firewall rules
   • Deploying database migrations
3. Add monitoring, autoscaling and infrastructure as code3 hrs
   • Configuring uptime alerts and logging sinks
   • Verifying horizontal pod autoscaling under load
   • Locking down Terraform state management
4. Optimize for cost and document the design2 hrs
   • Rightsizing compute instances and database tiers
   • Writing architecture documentation and READMEs
   • Preparing infrastructure runbooks
5. Portfolio, GitHub, mock interviews and career prep4 hrs
   • Structuring your GitHub repository for recruiters
   • Cloud architecture whiteboard mock interviews
   • Resume positioning for GCP and DevOps roles

Hands-on project: Build an end-to-end production architecture on GCP using Terraform, GKE, Cloud SQL, BigQuery, IAM, and Cloud Monitoring, complete with GitHub documentation and mock interview presentation.