Databricks Certified Associate Developer for Apache Spark — Question 6

Which of the following will occur if there are more slots than there are tasks?

Answer options

• A. The Spark job will likely not run as efficiently as possible.
• B. The Spark application will fail – there must be at least as many tasks as there are slots.
• C. Some executors will shut down and allocate all slots on larger executors first.
• D. More tasks will be automatically generated to ensure all slots are being used.
• E. The Spark job will use just one single slot to perform all tasks.

Correct answer: A

Explanation

The correct answer is A because having more slots than tasks can lead to inefficient resource utilization, as not all slots will be filled. Option B is incorrect since Spark can run with fewer tasks than slots, and the other options do not accurately describe the behavior of Spark in this scenario.