Free Practice Questions for Splunk SPLK-3003 Exam

 What happens to the indexer cluster when the indexer Cluster Master (CM) runs out of disk space is that the indexer cluster will continue to operate as long as no indexers fail. The CM does not store any indexed data or participate in data replication or searching. It only manages the cluster by maintaining information about peer status, bucket status, and search head status. Therefore, if the CM runs out of disk space, it will not affect the normal functioning of the indexers or search heads, unless an indexer fails or needs to be added or removed from the cluster. In that case, the CM will not be able to perform its management tasks and may cause data unavailability or inconsistency in the cluster. References:

https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/9.1.1/Indexer/Systemrequirements#Cluster_master_node

https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/9.1.1/Indexer/Masterfunctions

When adding a new search head to a search head cluster (SHC), the following scenario occurs:

The new search head connects to the deployer and pulls the most recently deployed bundle. The deployer is a Splunk instance that manages the app configuration bundle for the SHC. The bundle contains the app configurations and knowledge objects that are common to all the search heads in the cluster. The new search head downloads and extracts the bundle to its etc/shcluster/apps directory.

The new search head connects to the captain and replays any recent configuration changes to bring it up to date. The captain is one of the search heads in the cluster that coordinates the cluster activities and maintains the cluster state. The captain keeps track of any configuration changes that are made on any of the cluster members, such as creating or modifying dashboards, reports, alerts, or macros. The new search head requests these changes from the captain and applies them to its own configuration.

By following these steps, the new search head synchronizes its configuration with the rest of the cluster and becomes a fully functional member.

References:

Splunk Core Certified Consultant Test Blueprint

Splunk Documentation: Add a new member to a search head cluster

Splunk Documentation: Deploy apps across a search head cluster

Splunk Documentation: How a search head cluster works

The Monitoring Console (MC) health check configuration items are stored in a configuration file called checklist.conf. This file contains the definitions of the health check items, such as the search, description, severity, tags, and categories. You can modify this file to customize the existing health check items or create new ones. You can also download new health check items from the Splunk Health Assistant Add-on on splunkbase. References:

: Splunk Documentation: Monitoring Console: Access and customize health check1

: Splunk Documentation: Monitoring Console: Customize health check items2

The recommended solution to reduce the number of connection failures to the deployment server (DS) is to create a tiered deployment server topology. A tiered deployment server topology is a way of organizing the deployment server and its clients into multiple levels or tiers, where each tier has a different phone home interval and a different set of apps to deploy. This way, the deployment server can handle more clients without being overwhelmed by frequent connections and large app deployments. A tiered deployment server topology can also improve the performance and scalability of the deployment server, as well as reduce the network bandwidth consumption and latency.

The other options are incorrect because they either do not solve the problem or they make it worse. Option B is incorrect because reducing the phone home interval to 6 seconds will increase the number of connection failures to the DS, as it will make the clients connect more often and put more load on the DS. Option C is incorrect because leaving the phone home interval at 60 seconds will not reduce the number of connection failures to the DS, as it will not change the current situation. Option D is incorrect because increasing the phone home interval to 600 seconds will reduce the number of connection failures to the DS, but it will also reduce the responsiveness and reliability of the deployment server, as it will make the clients connect less often and delay the app deployments. References:

Splunk Core Consultant knowledge source documents or study guide: https://www.splunk.com/en_us/resources/splunk-certification-exam-study-guide.html

Splunk Test Blueprint Consultant: https://www.splunk.com/en_us/pdfs/training/splunk-test-blueprint-consultant.pdf

Plan a tiered deployment server topology1

 The internal Splunk authentication will take precedence over any external schemes, such as LDAP. This means that if a username exists in both $SPLUNK_HOME/etc/passwd and LDAP, the Splunk platform will attempt to log in the user using the native authentication first. If the authentication fails, and the failure is not due to a nonexistent local account, then the platform will not attempt to use LDAP to log in. If the failure is due to a nonexistent local account, then the Splunk platform will attempt a login using the LDAP authentication scheme. References:

https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/9.1.1/Security/SetupuserauthenticationwithLDAP#Precedence_of_Splunk_authentication_schemes 1

https://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/9.1.1/Security/SetupuserauthenticationwithLDAP#Precedence_of_Splunk_authentication_schemes 2