Cloud Digital Leader

Study Guide

v2.0
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Contents
Introduction 3
Learn more about the exam 4
Outline of learning path content 5
Course 1: Digital Transformation with Google Cloud 7
Course 2: Exploring Data Transformation with Google Cloud 9
Course 3: Innovating with Google Cloud Artificial Intelligence 11
Course 4: Modernize Infrastructure and Applications with Google Cloud 13
Course 5: Trust and Security with Google Cloud 15
Course 6: Scaling with Google Cloud Operations 17
Glossary 19
List of Google products and solutions 26
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Introduction
The Google Cloud Digital Leader training and exam are intended for tech-adjacent individuals who
want to demonstrate an overall knowledge of cloud technology concepts and Google Cloud.

The exam validates a candidate’s ability to complete the following course objectives:

● Identify Google Cloud products and solutions that support digital transformation.

● Explain how cloud technology and data can be used to innovate within organizations.

● Identify how organizations can innovate using Google Cloud’s artificial intelligence and
machine learning solutions.

● Explain infrastructure and application modernization with Google Cloud.

● Describe the fundamentals of cloud security Google’s trusted infrastructure.

● Explain how to optimize cloud costs and achieve operational excellence with Google Cloud.
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Learn more about the exam

A Cloud Digital Leader can distinguish and evaluate the various capabilities of Google Cloud core
products and services and how they can be used to achieve desired business goals. A Cloud Digital
Leader is well-versed in fundamental cloud concepts and can demonstrate a broad application of
cloud computing knowledge in various applications.

The Cloud Digital Leader exam is job-role independent. The exam assesses the knowledge and skills
of any individuals who want (or are required to) understand the purpose and application of Google
Cloud products.

The Cloud Digital Leader exam assesses knowledge in six areas:

● Digital Transformation with Google Cloud

● Exploring Data Transformation with Google Cloud

● Innovating with Google Cloud Artificial Intelligence

● Modernize Infrastructure and Applications with Google Cloud

● Trust and Security with Google Cloud

● Scaling with Google Cloud Operations

Sign up for the Cloud Digital Leader Learning Path through Google Cloud Skills Boost, Coursera, or
Pluralsight.
Prepare for the exam with sample questions.

Learn more about how and where to take the exam on the Cloud Digital Leader website.
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Outline of learning path content

For learners who have taken Google Cloud’s instructor-led training the terminology differs slightly.
Each course listed here refers to one module and each module refers to a lesson.

Course 1
Digital Transformation with Google Cloud
Module 1: Why Cloud Technology is Transforming Business

Module 2: Fundamental Cloud Concepts

Module 3: Cloud Computing Models and Shared Responsibility

Course 2
Exploring Data Transformation with Google Cloud
Module 1: The Value of Data

Module 2: Google Cloud Data Management Solutions

Module 3: Making Data Useful and Accessible

Course 3
Innovating with Google Cloud Artificial Intelligence
Module 1: AI and ML Fundamentals

Module 2: Google Cloud’s AI and ML Solutions

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Course 4
Modernize Infrastructure and Applications
with Google Cloud
Module 1: Important Cloud Migration Terms

Module 2: Modernizing Infrastructure in the Cloud

Module 3: Modernizing Applications in the Cloud

Course 5
Trust and Security with Google Cloud
Module 1: Trust and Security in the Cloud

Module 2: Google’s Trusted Infrastructure

Module 3: Google Cloud’s Trust Principles and Compliance

Course 6
Scaling with Google Cloud Operations
Module 1: Financial Governance and Managing Cloud Costs

Module 2: Operational Excellence and Reliability at Scale

Module 3: Sustainability with Google Cloud

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Course 1: Digital Transformation

with Google Cloud
Module 1: Why Cloud Technology is Revolutionizing Business
This module covers innovations throughout history that led to paradigm shifts, and looks at how
cloud technology is enabling a new wave of digital transformation. It defines some important terms
that you hear throughout the course, and it describes the benefits of adopting cloud technology to
digitally transform a business. It also provides real-world examples and discusses the challenges that
lead to a digital transformation.

Module 2: Fundamental cloud concepts

This module explains some fundamental cloud concepts and explains how migrating to the cloud
affects your organization’s flexibility, agility, reliability, and total cost of ownership. It explores the
different types of infrastructure and various use cases for them. It also describes the Google Cloud
network, how it’s structured, and how performance is measured and impacted.

Module 3: Cloud computing models and shared responsibility

This module explains the different cloud computing models: IaaS (infrastructure as a service), PaaS
(platform as a service), and SaaS (software as a service). It identifies the benefits and tradeoffs of
implementing each computing model and how to choose the most appropriate one to meet business
needs. It also explores the shared responsibility between an organization and its cloud provider in
hardware, software, and security.
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Key terms: Additional reading

Cloud, cloud technology, compute What is cloud computing?

power, computing, data, innovation,
What is digital transformation?
transformation cloud, total cost of ownership
(TCO), CapEx vs OpEx, network, regions, Cloud computing 101:
zones, IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, shared responsibility Frequently asked questions

What is Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)?

Google Cloud products list page

Google’s Guide to Innovation

Google Cloud Adoption Framework

Impact Study

Managing Change in the Cloud

Cloud Customer Case Studies

Google Cloud whitepapers

Cloud locations

Google Cloud infrastructure

(interactive web tool)
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Course 2: Exploring Data

Transformation with Google Cloud
Module 1: The Value of Data
This module explores the important role that data plays in an organization's digital transformation. It
examines how data generates business insights, drives decision making, and creates new value. It
explains how the cloud unlocks business value from all types of data, including structured data and
previously untapped unstructured data, and also examines how data governance is essential to a
successful data journey.

Module 2: Google Cloud data management solutions

This module explores Google Cloud data management products and solutions, and demonstrates
how they apply to different business use cases. It reviews the differences between Google Cloud
data management options, including data types and common business use cases, and explains
storage classes in Cloud Storage. The module also describes how organizations can migrate or
modernize a database in the cloud.

Module 3: Making data useful and accessible

This module examines how smart analytics, business intelligence tools, and streaming analytics can
add value in different business use cases. It outlines the benefits of using BigQuery and explores
how Looker democratizes access to data by empowering individuals to self-serve business
intelligence and create insights. This module also explains how streaming analytics in real time makes
data more useful and generates business value, and it reviews key Google Cloud products that
modernize data pipelines.
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Key terms: Additional reading

Data, data management, data value chain, data What is a data lake?
governance, structured data, unstructured data,
What is a data warehouse?
semi-structured data, databases, data
warehouses, data lakes, database migration, What is Cloud Storage?
business intelligence, streaming analytics
What is object storage?

What is big data?

What is streaming analytics?

What is business intelligence?

What is ETL?

Build a modern, unified data analytics

platform with Google Cloud

Principles and best practices for data

governance in the cloud
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Course 3: Innovating with Google

Cloud Artificial Intelligence
Module 1: AI and ML Fundamentals
Artificial intelligence and machine learning can provide many benefits to a business, but it’s
important to understand the fundamentals before starting any AI or ML initiative. This module
explores many of those fundamental concepts, including the difference between artificial
intelligence and machine learning, and how machine learning differs from data analytics and
business intelligence. It also outlines the different types of problems that AI solutions are suited to
solve and examines the importance of data quality, responsible AI practices, and explainable AI.

Module 2: Google Cloud’s AI and ML Solutions

This module explores four options to build ML models with Google Cloud: BigQuery ML, pre-trained
APIs, AutoML, and custom training. It explains how BigQuery ML can be used to create and execute
ML models in BigQuery by using standard SQL queries, and outlines the Natural Language API, Vision
API, Translation API, Speech-to-Text API, and Text-to-Speech API. The module also investigates
ways organizations can use their own data to train custom ML models with AutoML, and explains how
creating custom models with Google Cloud's Vertex AI can help businesses stand out from the
competition.
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Key terms: Additional reading

Artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), What is artificial intelligence?

data quality, responsible AI, explainable AI, ML
What is machine learning?
models
AI vs ML

Google Cloud’s AI Adoption Framework

Google Cloud Responsible AI

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Course 4: Modernize Infrastructure

and Applications with Google Cloud
Module 1: Important Cloud Migration Terms
This module lays the groundwork for understanding cloud migration by introducing essential
terminology. These terms serve as a foundation for further exploration into the modernization of
infrastructure and applications in the cloud.

Module 2: Modernizing Infrastructure in the Cloud

This module explores the options for and advantages of running compute workloads in the cloud,
and explaining containers and the business value of serverless computing. It investigates why
modernization and migration to the cloud are important steps in an organization’s transformation
journey, and how each application might have a different path. This module also examines the
options for and advantages of running compute workloads in the cloud, and also discusses the
advantages of using containers and serverless computing in application modernization.

Module 3: Modernizing Applications in the Cloud

This module focuses on application modernization and the business value of application
programming interfaces (APIs). It also explores the business reasons for choosing hybrid or
multi-cloud strategies and how GKE Enterprise enables these strategies.
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Key terms: Additional reading

Infrastructure modernization, virtual Google Cloud overview

machines, containers, serverless computing,
Google Cloud geography and regions
applications, rehosting, APIs, hybrid cloud,
multi-cloud Best practices for enterprise organizations

Google Cloud setup checklist

What are containers?

What is a hybrid cloud?

What is a virtual machine?

Migrate workloads to the public cloud:

an essential guide & checklist

Where should I run my stuff? Choosing a

Google Cloud compute option

CIO’s Guide to Application Migration

Google Cloud Networking overview blog

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Course 5: Trust and Security with

Google Cloud
Module 1: Trust and Security in the Cloud
This module explores the importance of control, compliance, confidentiality, integrity, and availability
in a cloud security model. It explains the difference between cloud security and traditional
on-premises security, and also examines today’s top cybersecurity threats and how they impact
businesses.

Module 2: Google’s Trusted Infrastructure

This module examines the benefits of data centers designed and built by Google and explores the
role of encryption in securing an organization’s data. It explains the difference between
authentication, authorization, and auditing, and outlines how Google products can help protect
against network attacks, including distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) by using Google Cloud
Armor.

Module 3: Google Cloud’s Trust Principles and Compliance

This module explores how Google Cloud's trust principles, transparency reports, and independent
third-party audits support customer trust. It examines the importance of data sovereignty and data
residency and the options Google Cloud offers organizations to control where their data is stored.
This module also discusses how the Google Cloud compliance resource center and Compliance
Reports Manager supports industry and regional compliance needs.
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Key terms: Additional reading

Encryption, zero trust model, least privileged What is cloud security?

model, phishing attack, physical damage, malware,
virus, ransomware, unsecured third party systems, What is encryption?
data at rest, data in transit, two-step verification,
SecOps, compliance Google Cloud security
foundations guide

Google security

Google Infrastructure Security

Design Overview

Voyage to the modern workplace

Encryption at rest in Google Cloud

Encryption in transit in Google Cloud

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Course 6: Scaling with Google

Cloud Operations
Module 1: Financial Governance and Managing Cloud Costs
This module explores how cloud financial governance best practices provides predictability and
control over cloud resources and defines important cloud cost-management terms and concepts. It
also examines the benefits of using the resource hierarchy to control access and considers how
resource quota policies, budget threshold rules, and Cloud Billing Reports can help control cloud
consumption.

Module 2: Operational excellence and reliability at scale

This module discusses the benefits of modernizing operations by using Google Cloud and defines
the main cloud operations, cloud reliability, DevOps, and SRT terms. It explains the importance of
designing resilient, fault-tolerant, and scalable infrastructure and processes and also explores how
Google Cloud Customer Care supports organizations as they move to the cloud.

Module 3: Sustainability with Google Cloud

This module explores Google Cloud's commitment to sustainability and how it supports
organizations' sustainability goals.
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Key terms: Additional reading

Resource hierarchy, DevOps, SRE, latency, traffic, A guide to financial governance

saturation, errors, SLO, SLA, SLI, monitoring, in the cloud
logging
Resource hierarchy

Increasing business value with better

IT operations: A guide to site reliability
engineering (SRE)

Exploring container security: the

shared responsibility model in GKE
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Glossary
Course 1
Bandwidth: A measure of how much data a network can transfer in a given time.

Capital expenditures (CapEx): Upfront business expenses put toward fixed assets. Organizations
buy these items once, and they benefit their business for years.

Cloud technology/computing – The technology and processes needed to store, manage, and
access data that is transferred over the Cloud (as opposed to data that remains on your computer’s
hard drive).

Compute power: The speed at which a computer can process data.

Computing: A machine’s ability to process, store, retrieve, compare and analyze information, and to
automate tasks often done by computer programs (otherwise known as software or applications).

Data – Any information that is useful to an organization. Can be numbers on a spreadsheet, text in
an email, audio or video recordings, images, or even ideas in employees’ heads. Includes internal and
external information.

Digital transformation – When an organization uses new technologies to redesign and redefine
relationships with their customers, employees, and partners. Digital transformation uses modern
digital technologies—including all types of public, private, and hybrid cloud platforms—to create or
modify business processes, culture, and customer experiences to meet changing business and
market dynamics.

Infrastructure as a service (IaaS): A computing model that offers the on-demand availability of
almost infinitely scalable infrastructure resources, such as compute, networking, storage, and
databases as services over the internet.

Network latency: The time it takes for data to travel from one point to another. Often measured in
milliseconds, latency, sometimes called lag, describes delays in communication over a network.

On-premises IT infrastructure – This refers to hardware and software applications that are hosted
on-site, located, and operated within an organization's data center to serve their unique needs.

Open source: Software with source code that is publicly accessible and free for anyone to use,
modify, and share.

Open standard: Software that follows particular specifications that are openly accessible and
usable by anyone.
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Operating expenses (OpEx): Recurring costs for a more immediate benefit. This represents the
day-to-day expenses to run a business.

Platform as a service (PaaS): A computing model that offers a cloud-based platform for
developing, running, and managing applications.

Private cloud: When an organization has virtualized servers in its own data centers, or those of a
private cloud provider, to create its own private dedicated environment.

Public cloud: Where on-demand computing services and infrastructure are managed by a
third-party provider, such as Google Cloud, and shared with multiple organizations or “tenants”
through the public internet.

Regions: Independent geographic areas where Google Cloud resources are deployed, composed of
zones.

Shared responsibility model: A model in which the responsibility to secure data is shared between
a business and the cloud provider. The cloud service provider is the data processor, whereas the
organization is the data controller.

Software as a service (SaaS): A computing model that offers an entire application, managed by a
cloud provider, through a web browser

The cloud: A metaphor for the network of data centers that store and compute information available
through the internet. It includes the complex web of software, computers, networks, and security
systems involved.

Total cost of ownership (TCO): A comprehensive assessment of all layers within the infrastructure
and other associated costs across the business over time. Includes acquiring hardware and
software, management and support, communications, and user expenses, and the cost of service
downtime, training, and other productivity losses.

Zone: A geographic area where Google Cloud resources are deployed.

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Course 2
Business intelligence: The process of collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data to make better
business decisions

Database: An organized collection of data generally stored in tables and accessed electronically
from a computer system. Built and optimized to enable the efficient ingestion of large amounts of
data from many different sources.

Data lake: Data lake is a repository designed to store, process, and secure large amounts of
structured, semistructured, and unstructured data. It can store data in its native format and process
any variety of it, ignoring size limits and serves many purposes, such as exploratory data analysis.

Data point: A piece of information (for example, a customer purchase or return).

Data: Raw or unprocessed information that can be used to derive insights.

Dataset: Aggregated data points of one category (for example, customer transactions).

Data value chain: The sequence of activities involved in transforming data into value for an
organization

Data warehouse: The central hub for all business data, it assembles data from multiple sources,
including databases. When combined with connector tools, it can transform unstructured data into
semi-structured data that can be used for analysis. Data warehouses are built to rapidly analyze and
report massive and multi-dimensional datasets on an ongoing basis, in real-time.

Metadata – Information about objects (for example, about images or audio).

Object storage – A data storage architecture for large stores of unstructured data, designating
each piece of data as an object (for example, audio or multimedia files).

Semi-structured data: Data that falls somewhere between structured and unstructured data. It’s
organized into a hierarchy, but without full differentiation or any particular ordering. Examples
include emails, HTML, JSON, and XML files.

Streaming analytics: The process of analyzing data in real time as it is being generated.

Structured data – Highly organized, quantitative data (for example, names or credit card numbers).
Easily stored and managed in databases.

Unstructured data – Data that has no organization and tends to be qualitative (e.g. word
processing documents or images). Can be stored as objects, which consist of the data in its native
format along with metadata such as unique identifiers.
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Course 3
Artificial intelligence (AI): A broad field or term that describes any kind of machine capable of a
task that normally requires human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition,
decision-making, or translation between languages.

Data quality: The degree to which data is complete, unique, timely, valid, accurate, and consistent.

Explainable AI: Techniques that make AI models more transparent and understandable to humans.

Machine learning (ML): A branch within the field of AI. Computers that can “learn” from data and
make predictions or decisions without being explicitly programmed to do so by using algorithms or
models to analyze data. These algorithms use historical data as input to predict new output values.

ML models: Mathematical models that are used to make predictions or decisions based on data.

Responsible AI: An approach to AI development and deployment that considers the ethical, social,
and environmental implications of AI.
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Course 4
Application (or app): A computer program or software that is designed to perform a specific digital
task, typically used or run by an end-user. In this digital age, customers expect applications to be
intuitive, well-functioning, and efficient.

Application programming interface (API) – A piece of software that interfaces with or connects
different applications and enables information to flow between systems. Unlike a user interface,
which connects a computer to a person, an API connects computers or pieces of software to each
other. One purpose of APIs is to hide the internal details of how a system works, exposing only those
parts a developer wants to allow a user or program to interface with. In this way APIs can help
organizations to adapt to modern business needs by allowing access to older legacy systems.

Container: Follows the same principle as a VM, providing an isolated environment to run software
services and optimize resources from one piece of hardware. Containers are more efficient than VMs
because they do not recreate a full representation of the hardware, but only recreate or virtualize the
operating system.

Hybrid cloud: An IT infrastructure that combines on-premises infrastructure with cloud

infrastructure, allowing organizations to leverage the benefits of both environments.

Kubernetes: An open source cluster management system that provides automated container
orchestration.

Multi-cloud: An IT infrastructure that uses multiple public cloud providers, such as Google Cloud, to
achieve greater flexibility, scalability, and cost savings.

Rehosting: Moving an application or system from one environment to another, such as from
on-premises to the cloud, without making any changes to the application or system itself.

Serverless computing: A cloud computing execution model in which the cloud provider allocates
machine resources on demand and takes care of the servers on behalf of their customers.
Businesses provide code for the function that they want to run and the cloud provider handles all
infrastructure management. Resources such as compute power are automatically provisioned behind
the scenes as needed.

Virtual machines (VM) – A VM is a virtualized instance of a server that re-creates the functionality
of a dedicated physical server. It uses a partitioned space inside a physical server which makes it
easy to optimize and reallocate resources and allow multiple systems to run on the same hardware.
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Course 5
Availability: The duration for which the cloud service provider guarantees that client’s data and
services are up and running or accessible.

Compliance: The act of adhering to laws, regulations, or standards.

Defense-in-depth: The cloud service provider manages the security of its infrastructure and its
data centers, and customers gain the benefits of their infrastructure’s multiple built-in security
layers.

Encryption: The process of encoding data stored in the cloud to safeguard it from unauthorized
access.

Least privilege model: A security principle that grants users only the minimum permissions
necessary to perform their tasks.

Malware: Software designed to harm a computer system, such as viruses, ransomware, and
spyware.

Phishing: An attempt to obtain personal information or credentials by sending fraudulent emails or

messages.

Privacy: The data an organization or an individual has access to, and who they can share that data
with.

SecOps: A collaborative approach to security that combines IT security and operations teams.

Security: The policies, procedures, and controls put in place to keep data and infrastructure safe.

Two-step verification: A security measure that requires users to enter a second verification code,
such as a code sent to their phone, in addition to their password to log in.

Zero trust model: A security approach that assumes no entity or user is trustworthy and requires
continuous verification before granting access.
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Course 6
DevOps: Developer operations. A philosophy that seeks to create a more collaborative and
accountable culture within developer and operations teams. Five objectives of DevOps include
reducing silos, accepting failure as normal, implementing gradual change, leveraging tooling and
automation, and measuring everything.

Latency: The time it takes for a system to respond to a request.

Log file: A text file where applications (including the operating system) write events. Log files make it
easier for developers, DevOps, and system administrators to get insights and identify the root cause
of issues within applications and the infrastructure.

Logging: A process that allows IT teams to analyze selected logs and accelerate application
troubleshooting.

Monitoring: Gathering predefined sets of metrics or logs. Monitoring is the foundation for site
reliability engineering because it provides visibility into the performance, uptime, and overall health
of cloud powered applications.

Resource hierarchy: How an IT team can organize a business’s Google Cloud environment and how
that service structure maps to the organization’s actual structure. It determines what resources
users can access.

Saturation: The point at which a system is no longer able to handle any more requests.

SLA (Service Level Agreement): A contract between a service provider and a customer that
specifies the level of service that will be provided.

SLI (Service Level Indicator): A quantitative measure of a particular aspect of service

performance, such as latency or error rate.

SLO (Service Level Objective): A target for a particular SLI, such as a maximum latency of 200
milliseconds.

SRE: Site reliability engineering. A discipline that applies aspects of software engineering to
operations. The goals of SRE are to create scalable and highly reliable software systems. Best
practices central to SRE align with DevOps objectives.

Traffic: The amount of data or number of requests that a system is handling.

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List of Google products and solutions

Learn more about Google Cloud products at [Link]/products.

Learn more about Google Cloud solutions at [Link]/solutions.

Apigee API Management: A platform for developing and managing APIs.

App Engine: A platform for building scalable web applications and mobile backends.

Bare Metal: Infrastructure to run specialized workloads on Google Cloud.

BigQuery: Google Cloud’s leading data warehouse solution.

Cloud Bigtable: Google's NoSQL big data database service.

Cloud Functions: An event-driven compute platform for cloud services and apps.

Cloud Identity: A unified platform for IT administrators to manage user devices and apps.

Cloud Logging: An audit, platform, and application logs management tool.

Cloud Monitoring: A tool monitoring infrastructure and application health with rich metrics.

Cloud Profiler: Continuous CPU and heap profiling to improve performance and reduce costs.

Cloud Run: A fully managed environment for running containerized apps.

Cloud Spanner: A fully managed Google Cloud database service designed for global scale.

Cloud SQL: Google Cloud’s database service (relational database management service).

Cloud Storage: Google Cloud’s object storage service for structured, semi-structured, and
structured data. One of several products used in data lake solutions.

Cloud Trace: A tracing system collecting latency data from applications.

Compute Engine: Virtual machines running in Google’s data center.

Cost Management: Tools for monitoring, controlling, and optimizing business costs.

Dataflow: A fully managed streaming analytics service that creates a pipeline to process both
streaming data and batch data.

Firebase: An app development software to build, improve, and grow mobile and web apps.
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Google Cloud console: A web-based interface for managing and monitoring cloud apps.

Google Kubernetes Engine: An open source container orchestration system for automating
computer application deployment, scaling, and management.

Looker: Google Cloud’s business intelligence solution.

Pub/Sub: A distributed messaging service that can receive messages from various device streams
such as gaming events, IoT devices, and application streams. The name is short for
Publisher/Subscriber.

TensorFlow: An end-to-end open source platform for machine learning, with a comprehensive,
flexible ecosystem of tools, libraries and community resources, originally created by Google.

Vertex AI: A unified platform for training, hosting and managing ML models. Features include
AutoML and custom training.

VMware Engine: An engine for migrating and running VMware workloads natively on Google Cloud.