Salesforce Cloud Computing Interview: Infrastructure
Question Description
What this question assesses
You will be asked to demonstrate foundational cloud computing knowledge for infrastructure-focused roles: compare virtualization vs. containerization, evaluate major cloud providers (AWS vs. GCP), and choose appropriate compute services (EC2, Lambda, EKS) based on scalability, cost, and operational trade-offs.
Typical flow in the interview
First, you may explain definitions and trade-offs (VMs vs containers, isolation, boot time, resource overhead). Next, you'll contrast provider-specific features and managed services (region/zone differences, networking, IAM, managed Kubernetes offerings). Then you'll walk through a decision: given workload requirements (latency, burstiness, statefulness, operational maturity), pick EC2, Lambda, or EKS and justify the choice. Finally, expect a hands-on or whiteboard discussion about implementing the chosen option in Kubernetes (EKS): writing YAML for deployments, using sidecar patterns for logging/observability or security, network policies, service meshes, and lifecycle concerns.
Skills and signals to show
You should show clear trade-off reasoning (cost vs operational overhead vs scaling), familiarity with compute service characteristics (cold starts, autoscaling modes, node management), practical Kubernetes skills (Deployment/Service/Ingress YAML, ConfigMaps, Secrets, RBAC), and awareness of networking and security considerations (VPCs, subnets, IAM roles, network policies). Concrete examples and small diagrams or YAML snippets will strengthen your answers.
Common Follow-up Questions
- •Given a stateful, low-latency service, how would you migrate from EC2 instances to EKS while minimizing downtime and data loss?
- •Explain the cost-optimization strategies you would apply when using Lambda vs EKS for spiky workloads — how do you model and compare costs?
- •Describe how you’d implement a sidecar pattern for observability and for zero-trust networking in Kubernetes; include YAML-level details and RBAC considerations.
- •How do networking and IAM differ between AWS and GCP managed Kubernetes offerings, and what implications do those differences have for multi-cluster networking?
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