Google Cloud Fundamentals for Cloud Engineers
Learn Google Cloud from zero: projects and IAM, Compute Engine, GKE, Cloud Run, storage, databases, VPCs, and monitoring, mapped to the ACE exam.
What You'll Learn
Understanding Why Google Cloud's Mental Model Is Different
Note: You can skip this section if you already know that a project is the unit of billing and IAM in Google Cloud.
Understanding the Resource Hierarchy and Projects
Note: You can skip this section if you can already explain how an organization, folder, and project inherit policy.
Managing Billing, Budgets, and Quotas
Note: You can skip this section if you already link projects to billing accounts and set budget alerts.
Managing Access with IAM and Service Accounts
Note: You can skip this section if you can already choose between basic, predefined, and custom roles.
Choosing and Running Compute
Note: You can skip this section if you can already match a workload to Compute Engine, GKE, Cloud Run, or a function.
Choosing Storage and Databases
Note: You can skip this section if you can already pick a Cloud Storage class and match a database to a workload.
Skills You'll Master
Curriculum Index11 topics
Understanding Why Google Cloud's Mental Model Is Different
Note: You can skip this section if you already know that a project is the unit of billing and IAM in Google Cloud.
Understanding the Resource Hierarchy and Projects
Note: You can skip this section if you can already explain how an organization, folder, and project inherit policy.
Managing Billing, Budgets, and Quotas
Note: You can skip this section if you already link projects to billing accounts and set budget alerts.
Managing Access with IAM and Service Accounts
Note: You can skip this section if you can already choose between basic, predefined, and custom roles.
Choosing and Running Compute
Note: You can skip this section if you can already match a workload to Compute Engine, GKE, Cloud Run, or a function.
Choosing Storage and Databases
Note: You can skip this section if you can already pick a Cloud Storage class and match a database to a workload.
Building Networks: VPCs, Firewalls, and Load Balancing
Note: You can skip this section if you already know that a Google Cloud VPC is global and firewall rules target tags or...
Operating with Cloud Monitoring and Logging
Note: You can skip this section if you already build alerting policies and filter logs with the Logging query language.
Preparing for the Associate Cloud Engineer Exam
Note: You can skip this section if you are using this module for work and not for the certification.
Running the Hands-On Lab: A Connected Google Cloud Environment
Before you start This lab builds a private VM that reads a bucket using its own service account, a Cloud Run service, a...
Quick Reference and Common Mistakes
Quick reference Common mistakes Defaulting to the Editor basic role grants broad create and change access across nearly...
Career Impact
Roles that use the skills in this module.
Cloud Engineer
DevOps Engineer
Solutions Architect
Next Modules
Related Guides
Practice on the Coding Sheet
Not a software engineer sheet. Every problem comes from real DevOps, SRE, Platform and Cloud interviews, from your first script to a system you build yourself.
Open the Coding SheetFrequently Asked Questions
A project is the container that every Google Cloud resource lives in. It is also the unit that billing and IAM permissions are scoped to, so almost every setup decision starts with choosing the right project.
No. A Google Cloud VPC is a global resource, and only its subnets are regional. One VPC can span several regions without peering, which changes how you plan networks.
Avoid it whenever you can. Attach the service account to the VM or Cloud Run service, or use impersonation, so the workload gets short lived credentials. A downloaded key is a long lived secret that can leak.
No. The module teaches practical skills first and maps each topic to the exam areas, so you can use it for work or for the certification. Always read the current official exam guide before you book.