AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate (SAA-C03/SAA-C04) reference guide [2025]

This repository contains a reference guide with key information to help you prepare for the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate (SAA-C03/SAA-C04) exam, updated for 2025.

This reference guide summarizes important services, concepts, and best practices tested in the exam. It can be used as a quick reference guide for studying.

The information is organized into the following sections:

Table of Contents

• AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate (SAA-C03/SAA-C04) reference guide
  • Table of Contents
  • Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
  • Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS)
  • Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR)
  • Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS)
  • AWS Lambda
  • Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC)
  • Amazon Route 53
  • Amazon Elastic Load Balancing (ELB)
  • AWS Transfer for SFTP
  • AWS Direct Connect
  • Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3)
  • Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS)
  • Amazon Elastic File System (EFS)
  • Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS)
  • Amazon Aurora
  • Amazon DynamoDB
  • Amazon Redshift
  • Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS)
  • Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS)
  • Amazon API Gateway
  • Amazon Cognito
  • Amazon CloudWatch
  • AWS CloudTrail
  • AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM)
  • AWS Key Management Service (KMS)
  • AWS Security Hub
  • AWS CloudFormation
  • AWS Systems Manager
  • AWS Well-Architected Framework
  • AWS Core Services
  • AWS Networking and Security Services
  • AWS Deployment and Management Services
  • AWS Cost Optimization Strategies
  • Amazon EventBridge
  • AWS Step Functions
  • Amazon Kinesis
  • Amazon GuardDuty
  • Amazon Inspector
  • Amazon Macie
  • AWS IAM Access Analyzer
  • AWS CodePipeline
  • AWS CodeBuild
  • AWS CodeDeploy
  • AWS CodeCommit
  • Contributing
  • License

Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)

Amazon EC2 provides secure, resizable compute capacity in the cloud. Key exam concepts:

• Instance Types:

  • General Purpose (M7g, T4g, M7i, T3, M7a, M7gd)
  • Compute Optimized (C7g, C7i, C7a, C7gd)
  • Memory Optimized (R7iz, X2idn, X2iedn, R7a, R7g, U7i family, I7i, I7ie)
  • Accelerated Computing (P4d, G5, VT1, P5en, Trn2)
  • Storage Optimized (Im4gn, Is4gen, I4i)

• Pricing Models:

  • On-Demand (short-term needs)
  • Savings Plans (1-3 year commitment, restricted to single end customer usage from June 1, 2025)
  • Spot Instances (up to 90% discount)
  • Reserved Instances (capacity reservation, restricted to single end customer usage from June 1, 2025)
  • Dedicated Hosts (physical servers for your use)
  • Dedicated Instances (EC2 instances on single-tenant hardware)
  • Capacity Reservations (reserve EC2 capacity for any duration)

• Advanced Features:

  • Nitro System (enhanced security & performance)
  • Elastic Fabric Adapter (EFA) for HPC and ML networking
  • Capacity Blocks for ML (reserved GPU capacity for specific durations, leveraging new AI/ML instances like P5en, Trn2)
  • EC2 Instance Connect for browser-based SSH
  • EC2 Fleet and Spot Fleet (combining On-Demand, Reserved, and Spot Instances)

• Best Practices:

  • Use Instance Metadata Service (IMDSv2) for enhanced security
  • Enable Detailed Monitoring for <1-minute metrics (CloudWatch)
  • Leverage Placement Groups (Cluster, Spread, Partition) for specific workload needs
  • Utilize EC2 Auto Scaling for elasticity and high availability
  • Implement AWS Systems Manager for operational automation
  • Continuously monitor and optimize costs using AWS Cost Explorer and Compute Optimizer

EC2 is a core service in AWS, and it is used by millions of customers around the world. It is a powerful and flexible tool that can be used to build and run a wide variety of applications.

Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS)

Amazon ECS is a highly scalable, high-performance container orchestration service that supports Docker containers. ECS enables you to easily deploy, manage, and scale containerized applications. ECS provides a variety of features to help you manage your containerized applications, including:

• Service discovery: ECS automatically discovers and registers your containers, so you can easily access them from your application.
• Load balancing: ECS automatically distributes traffic across your containers, so you can ensure that your application is highly available.
• Health monitoring: ECS monitors the health of your containers and automatically restarts any unhealthy containers.
• Auto scaling: ECS can automatically scale your containers up or down based on demand, so you can ensure that your application has the resources it needs.

Here is some short information about Amazon ECS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• ECS is a highly scalable, high-performance container orchestration service.
• ECS supports Docker containers and OCI compliant images.
• ECS offers various launch types, including EC2 and serverless AWS Fargate.
• ECS provides a variety of features to help you manage your containerized applications, including service discovery, load balancing, health monitoring, auto scaling, and deep integration with persistent storage.
• ECS Anywhere extends ECS to run containers on your own infrastructure (on-premises, other clouds).

Here are some additional details about Amazon ECS that you may want to know:

• ECS can be used to deploy and manage containerized applications in any AWS Region.
• ECS can be used to deploy and manage containerized applications of any size, from a small website to a large enterprise application.
• ECS can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, Amazon Route 53, Amazon EBS, and Amazon EFS.
• Supports Windows Containers for specific workloads.
• The AWS Copilot CLI simplifies deployment and management of containerized applications on ECS.
• Emphasizes security and isolation by design for containerized workloads.

ECS is a powerful tool for managing containerized applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you deploy, manage, and scale your containerized applications securely and efficiently.

Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR)

Amazon ECR is a fully managed container registry that makes it easy to store, manage, and deploy Docker container images and Open Container Initiative (OCI) compatible artifacts. ECR is integrated with Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS) and Amazon Kubernetes Service (EKS), so you can easily deploy your containerized applications to production.

Here is some short information about Amazon ECR that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• ECR is a fully managed container registry.
• ECR is integrated with ECS and EKS.
• ECR stores Docker container images and OCI compatible artifacts.
• ECR provides a variety of features to help you manage your container images, including:
• Image tagging and versioning
• Image replication
• Image scanning
• Image lifecycle management

Here are some additional details about Amazon ECR that you may want to know:

• ECR can be used to store container images of any size.
• ECR images can be deployed to ECS or EKS clusters in any AWS Region.
• ECR images can be accessed using the AWS Management Console, the AWS CLI, or the AWS SDKs.
• ECR supports IPv6 for enhanced networking capabilities.
• ECR provides Pull Through Cache rules to automatically cache images from upstream public registries.

ECR is a powerful tool for managing container images. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you manage your images securely and efficiently.

Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS)

Amazon EKS is a fully managed Kubernetes service that makes it easy to deploy, manage, and scale Kubernetes applications on AWS. EKS provides Kubernetes worker nodes, while the control plane is managed by AWS. EKS also provides a variety of features to help you manage your Kubernetes applications, including:

• Kubernetes orchestration: EKS automatically provisions and manages Kubernetes clusters, so you can focus on building and running your applications.
• Security: EKS provides a variety of security features to help you protect your Kubernetes applications, including encryption, authentication, and authorization.
• Load balancing: EKS provides load balancing for your Kubernetes applications, so you can ensure that your applications are highly available.
• Monitoring: EKS provides monitoring for your Kubernetes applications, so you can track the health and performance of your applications.

Here is some short information about Amazon EKS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• EKS is a fully managed Kubernetes service.
• EKS provides a Kubernetes API server, a Kubernetes control plane, and Kubernetes worker nodes. As of January 24, 2025, Amazon EKS supports Kubernetes version 1.32.
• EKS provides a variety of features to help you manage your Kubernetes applications, including Kubernetes orchestration, enhanced security, flexible load balancing options (ALB, NLB, CLB), and comprehensive monitoring (CloudWatch Container Insights).

Here are some additional details about Amazon EKS that you may want to know:

• EKS can be used to deploy and manage Kubernetes applications in any AWS Region.
• EKS can be used to deploy and manage Kubernetes applications of any size, from a small website to a large enterprise application.
• EKS can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, and Amazon Route 53.
• The EKS Dashboard provides centralized visibility and management of Kubernetes clusters.
• EKS Pod Identity simplifies IAM credentials for pods.
• Expanded support for Edge and Hybrid use cases (e.g., EKS Anywhere).

EKS is a powerful tool for managing Kubernetes applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you deploy, manage, and scale your Kubernetes applications securely and efficiently.

AWS Lambda

AWS Lambda is a serverless compute service that lets you run code without provisioning or managing servers. Lambda executes your code only when needed and scales automatically, so you can focus on your code and not on managing infrastructure. Lambda supports a variety of programming languages and runtimes (e.g., Node.js 22, Python 3.13, Java 21, .NET 9, Ruby 3.4, and custom runtimes for Go).

Here is some short information about AWS Lambda that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Lambda is a serverless compute service.
• Lambda executes your code only when needed and scales automatically.
• Lambda supports a variety of programming languages and runtimes, with continuous updates and deprecation cycles.

Here are some additional details about AWS Lambda that you may want to know:

• Lambda functions can be triggered by a variety of events, such as HTTP requests, changes to S3 objects, and messages from Kinesis streams.
• Lambda functions can be used to build a wide variety of applications, including web applications, mobile backends, and data processing pipelines.
• Lambda functions can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as API Gateway, S3, and DynamoDB.
• Supports arm64 architecture (AWS Graviton) for improved performance and cost efficiency.
• Utilizes Amazon Linux 2023 for newer runtimes.
• Allows deploying Lambda functions as container images for larger dependencies and familiar tooling.

Lambda is a powerful tool for building serverless applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you develop, deploy, and manage your serverless applications efficiently.

Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC)

Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) enables you to launch AWS resources into a logically isolated virtual network that you define. This virtual network closely resembles a traditional network that you'd operate in your own data center, with the benefits of using the scalable infrastructure of AWS.

Here is some short information about Amazon VPC that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• VPC is a logically isolated virtual network that you define.
• VPC provides you with complete control over your virtual networking environment, including the selection of your own IP address range, creation of subnets, and configuration of route tables, network gateways (Internet Gateway, Virtual Private Gateway), and VPC Endpoints.
• You can use both IPv4 and IPv6 for most resources in your VPC, supporting dual-stack configurations.
• VPC can be used to build a wide variety of networks, including public networks, private networks, and hybrid networks, with options for VPC Peering and Transit Gateway for inter-VPC connectivity.

Here are some additional details about Amazon VPC that you may want to know:

• VPCs can be divided into subnets, which are smaller, isolated networks within your VPC.
• You can configure route tables to control how traffic flows between subnets, and between your VPC and the internet or other VPCs.
• You can use network gateways to connect your VPC to the internet or to other VPCs.
• You can use security groups to control inbound and outbound traffic to and from your VPC resources at the instance level, and Network Access Control Lists (NACLs) at the subnet level.
• VPC Flow Logs capture information about the IP traffic going to and from network interfaces in your VPC, enabling monitoring and troubleshooting.

VPC is a powerful tool for building and managing secure and isolated networks in the cloud. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you meet your networking needs.

Amazon Route 53

Amazon Route 53 is a highly scalable and available cloud Domain Name System (DNS) web service. It provides a reliable and secure way to route end users to internet applications by translating domain names, such as example.com, to the numeric IP addresses of the underlying infrastructure where the applications are hosted.

Here is some short information about Amazon Route 53 that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Route 53 is a highly scalable and available cloud DNS web service.
• Route 53 provides a reliable and secure way to route end users to internet applications.
• Route 53 supports a variety of DNS record types, including A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, NS, SOA, TXT, SRV, and CAA.
• Route 53 provides a variety of features to help you manage your DNS records, including:
• DNS health checks
• Traffic flow routing (including Geolocation, Latency, Weighted, Failover, and Multi-value answer routing)
• Geolocation routing
• Alias records
• Route 53 Resolver (for DNS resolution within your VPC)
• DNSSEC support for enhanced security

Here are some additional details about Amazon Route 53 that you may want to know:

• Route 53 can be used to route traffic to any type of internet application, including websites, web applications, mobile applications, and APIs.
• Route 53 can be used to route traffic to applications hosted on AWS, on-premises, or with other cloud providers.
• Route 53 can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, and Amazon CloudFront.

Route 53 is a powerful tool for managing DNS records and routing traffic to internet applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you meet your DNS and routing needs.

Amazon Elastic Load Balancing (ELB)

Elastic Load Balancing (ELB) is a load balancing service that automatically distributes incoming traffic across multiple targets, such as EC2 instances, containers, and IP addresses, in one or more Availability Zones. It monitors the health of its registered targets and ensures that traffic is routed only to the healthy targets. ELB scales your load balancer capacity automatically in response to changes in incoming traffic.

Here is some short information about Amazon ELB that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• ELB is a load balancing service that distributes incoming traffic across multiple targets.
• ELB monitors the health of its registered targets and routes traffic only to the healthy targets.
• ELB scales your load balancer capacity automatically in response to changes in incoming traffic.
• ELB supports four different types of load balancers:
• Application Load Balancer: Routes traffic to web applications (Layer 7).
• Network Load Balancer: Routes traffic to TCP and UDP applications (Layer 4).
• Gateway Load Balancer: Enables you to deploy, scale, and manage third-party virtual appliances.
• Classic Load Balancer: A legacy load balancer that is still supported, but not recommended for new applications.

Here are some additional details about Amazon ELB that you may want to know:

• ELB can be used to load balance traffic to applications hosted on AWS, on-premises, or with other cloud providers.
• ELB can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, and Amazon CloudFront.
• ELB provides a variety of features to help you manage your load balancers, including:
• Health checks: Monitors the health of your registered targets and routes traffic only to the healthy targets.
• Listener rules: Routes traffic to different targets based on the request.
• Target groups: Groups of targets that you can register with your load balancer.
• Security groups: Controls inbound and outbound traffic to and from your load balancer.

Elastic Load Balancing is a powerful tool for distributing incoming traffic across multiple targets and ensuring that your applications are highly available and scalable. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you meet your load balancing needs.

AWS Transfer for SFTP

AWS Transfer for SFTP is a managed service that makes it easy to transfer files over the Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP). It provides a secure and reliable way to transfer files between your on-premises systems and AWS storage services, such as Amazon S3 and Amazon Elastic File System (EFS).

Here is some short information about AWS Transfer for SFTP that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS Transfer for SFTP is a managed service that makes it easy to transfer files over SFTP, FTPS, and FTP.
• AWS Transfer for SFTP provides a secure and reliable way to transfer files between your on-premises systems and AWS storage services.
• AWS Transfer for SFTP supports a variety of SFTP clients, including WinSCP, Cyberduck, and FileZilla.
• AWS Transfer for SFTP provides a variety of features to help you manage your file transfers, including:
• User and group management (including integration with AWS IAM and Active Directory)
• Access control (using IAM roles and policies)
• Activity logging (via CloudTrail)
• File transfer notifications (using Amazon SNS)
• Support for multiple authentication methods, including password, SSH keys, and directory service integration.

Here are some additional details about AWS Transfer for SFTP that you may want to know:

• AWS Transfer for SFTP can be used to transfer files of any size, from small text files to large video files.
• AWS Transfer for SFTP can be used to transfer files between your on-premises systems and AWS storage services in any AWS Region.
• AWS Transfer for SFTP can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon CloudTrail and Amazon CloudWatch.

AWS Transfer for SFTP is a powerful tool for transferring files over SFTP securely and reliably. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you manage your file transfers efficiently.

AWS Direct Connect

AWS Direct Connect is a dedicated network connection between your on-premises network and one of the AWS Direct Connect locations. It provides a secure, reliable, and high-performance connection to AWS. AWS Direct Connect can be used to connect to any AWS service, including Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, and Amazon RDS.

Here is some short information about AWS Direct Connect that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS Direct Connect is a dedicated network connection between your on-premises network and AWS.
• AWS Direct Connect provides a secure, reliable, and high-performance connection to AWS.
• AWS Direct Connect can be used to connect to any AWS service.
• AWS Direct Connect offers two main types of connections:
• Dedicated Connections: A dedicated physical connection between your on-premises network and AWS, offering a range of bandwidth options.
• Hosted Connections: A connection provisioned by an AWS Direct Connect partner, with pre-defined bandwidth options.

Here are some additional details about AWS Direct Connect that you may want to know:

• AWS Direct Connect is a global service with locations in over 90 cities around the world.
• AWS Direct Connect offers a variety of bandwidth options, from 1 Gbps to 100 Gbps.
• AWS Direct Connect can be used to create a variety of network configurations, including site-to-site VPNs, point-to-point connections, hub-and-spoke networks, and integration with AWS Transit Gateway for simplified network management.
• AWS Direct Connect can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as AWS Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) and AWS Transit Gateway.

AWS Direct Connect is a powerful tool for connecting your on-premises network to AWS securely, reliably, and with high performance. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you meet your networking needs.

Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3)

Amazon S3 is a highly scalable, durable, and available object storage service that is designed for storing and retrieving any amount of data, from anywhere on the web. S3 provides a secure, durable, and low-cost storage infrastructure to host your static websites, store data used by web services, mobile applications, backup and restore, archiving and disaster recovery, analytics, big data applications, and machine learning workloads.

Here is some short information about Amazon S3 that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• S3 is a highly scalable, durable, and available object storage service.
• S3 can be used to store any type of data, including web pages, images, videos, and databases.
• S3 is secure, durable, and low-cost.
• S3 is easy to use and provides a variety of features to help you manage your data, including:
• Object versioning
• Access control (IAM, Bucket Policies, Access Points, Access Grants)
• Bucket policies
• Server-side encryption (SSE-S3, SSE-KMS, SSE-C)
• Static website hosting
• S3 Storage Lens (for organization-wide visibility)
• S3 Object Lambda (process data as it is retrieved)

Here are some additional details about Amazon S3 that you may want to know:

• S3 stores data in buckets, which are logical containers for your data.
• S3 objects are uniquely identified by a key (name) and a version ID (if versioning is enabled).
• S3 objects can be up to 5 TB in size.
• S3 offers a variety of storage classes to meet your needs, including S3 Standard, S3 Intelligent-Tiering, S3 Standard-IA, S3 One Zone-IA, S3 Glacier Instant Retrieval, S3 Glacier Flexible Retrieval, S3 Glacier Deep Archive, and S3 Express One Zone.
• S3 can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon CloudFront, Amazon Lambda, AWS Storage Gateway, and AWS Lake Formation.
• S3 Access Grants for simplified data access management.
• S3 Express One Zone for high-performance access.

Amazon S3 is a powerful tool for storing and retrieving any amount of data. It is easy to use and provides a variety of features to help you manage your data securely, reliably, and efficiently.

Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS)

Elastic Block Store (EBS) is a block-level storage service designed for use with Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances. EBS volumes provide persistent storage for applications running on EC2 instances. EBS volumes are replicated within the Availability Zone in which they are created to protect against data loss.

EBS volumes are available in five volume types:

• General Purpose SSD (gp3): Recommended for most workloads. Baseline 3,000 IOPS and 125 MB/s throughput, scalable to 16,000 IOPS and 1,000 MB/s.
• Provisioned IOPS SSD (io2 Block Express): Highest performance SSD for mission-critical applications. Supports up to 256,000 IOPS and 4,000 MB/s throughput per volume. Supports Multi-Attach.
• Throughput Optimized HDD (st1): Cost-effective for frequently accessed, throughput-intensive workloads like big data.
• Cold HDD (sc1): Lowest cost HDD for less frequently accessed workloads.
• io1 (Legacy): Previous generation Provisioned IOPS SSD.
• gp2 (Legacy): Previous generation General Purpose SSD.
• EBS Snapshots Archive: Cost-effective long-term storage for EBS snapshots.

EBS volumes can be attached to EC2 instances at any time, and they can be resized up or down without downtime. EBS volumes can also be used to create snapshots, which are point-in-time copies of an EBS volume. Snapshots can be used to create new EBS volumes, or to restore an EBS volume to a previous state.

EBS is an important part of the AWS Well-Architected Framework. The Well-Architected Framework is a set of best practices for designing and building cloud architectures. The Well-Architected Framework recommends using EBS for persistent storage for all applications running on EC2 instances.

Here is some additional information about EBS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• EBS volumes are attached to EC2 instances using block device mappings.
• EBS volumes can be encrypted at rest using AWS Key Management Service (KMS).
• EBS volumes can be encrypted in transit using Transport Layer Security (TLS).
• EBS volumes can be used to create RAID arrays.
• EBS volumes can be used to create boot volumes for EC2 instances.
• EBS volumes can be used to create root volumes for EC2 instances.
• EBS volumes can be used to create data volumes for EC2 instances.

Amazon Elastic File System (EFS)

Amazon Elastic File System (EFS) is a cloud-based, elastic file system that provides a simple, scalable, and durable way to share files across multiple Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances and on-premises servers. EFS is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your storage.

EFS file systems are highly available and durable, and they can scale to petabytes of data. EFS also provides strong consistency and file locking, making it a good choice for a wide range of workloads, including web applications, content management systems, and databases.

Here is some short information about EFS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• EFS is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your storage.
• EFS file systems are highly available and durable, and they can scale to petabytes of data.
• EFS provides strong consistency and file locking.
• EFS can be used with EC2 instances, Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS), Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS), AWS Lambda functions, and AWS Fargate.
• EFS can be used to store data for a wide range of workloads, including web applications, content management systems, databases, and machine learning.
• EFS One Zone storage class for cost-optimized storage.
• EFS Replication for cross-region data protection.

Here are some additional details about EFS that you may want to know:

• EFS uses the Network File System (NFS) protocol to provide access to file systems.
• EFS file systems can be mounted on EC2 instances in your virtual private cloud (VPC).
• EFS file systems can be accessed from on-premises servers using AWS Direct Connect or AWS VPN.
• EFS file systems can be encrypted using AWS Key Management Service (KMS).
• EFS file systems can be used to create RAID arrays.
• EFS file systems can be used to create boot volumes for EC2 instances.

Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS)

Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS) is a managed database service that provides a relational database infrastructure for deploying, scaling, and managing relational databases in the cloud. RDS supports a variety of database engines, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle Database, Microsoft SQL Server, and Amazon Aurora.

Here is some short information about RDS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• RDS is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your database.
• RDS supports a variety of database engines, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle Database, Microsoft SQL Server, Amazon Aurora, MariaDB, and SAP HANA.
• RDS provides high availability and durability for your databases.
• RDS offers a variety of features to help you secure your databases, including encryption, access control, auditing, and integration with AWS Secrets Manager.
• RDS can be used to deploy a wide range of database workloads, including web applications, content management systems, and enterprise applications.

Here are some additional details about RDS that you may want to know:

• RDS instances can be deployed in a variety of deployment options, including single-AZ, Multi-AZ (with standby or Multi-AZ DB cluster deployments), and read replicas.
• RDS instances can be backed up automatically to Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3).
• RDS instances can be restored from backups to create new RDS instances.
• RDS instances can be scaled up or down without downtime.
• RDS instances can be migrated from one database engine to another.

Amazon Aurora

Amazon Aurora is a relational database service that combines the performance and availability of high-end commercial databases with the simplicity and cost-effectiveness of open source databases. Aurora is MySQL and PostgreSQL compatible, so developers can use existing code, skills, and tools to build new applications, or migrate existing applications to the cloud.

Here is some short information about Aurora that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Aurora is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your database.
• Aurora is compatible with MySQL and PostgreSQL, so developers can use existing code, skills, and tools to build new applications, or migrate existing applications to the cloud.
• Aurora is up to five times faster than standard MySQL and PostgreSQL databases, and it offers 99.99% availability.
• Aurora is cost-effective, and it offers a variety of features to help you save money, such as automatic scaling, reserved instances, and serverless options.
• Aurora can be used to deploy a wide range of database workloads, including web applications, content management systems, enterprise applications, and machine learning.

Here are some additional details about Aurora that you may want to know:

• Aurora uses a distributed storage system to achieve high performance and availability.
• Aurora supports multiple Availability Zones for high availability and disaster recovery.
• Aurora offers continuous backup and point-in-time recovery.
• Aurora can be scaled up or down without downtime.
• Aurora is compatible with Amazon RDS tools and APIs.

Amazon DynamoDB

Amazon DynamoDB is a fully managed, multi-region, multi-master, durable NoSQL database with built-in security, backup and restore, and in-memory caching for internet-scale applications. DynamoDB provides single-digit millisecond performance at any scale. It's a flexible and scalable database that can be used for a wide range of workloads, including mobile, web, gaming, ad tech, IoT, and more.

Here is some short information about DynamoDB that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• DynamoDB is a NoSQL database, which means that it does not use a traditional relational database schema.
• DynamoDB is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your database.
• DynamoDB is highly available and durable, and it can scale to petabytes of data.
• DynamoDB provides single-digit millisecond performance at any scale.
• DynamoDB is cost-effective, and it offers a variety of features to help you save money, such as reserved capacity, provisioned throughput, and on-demand capacity mode.
• DynamoDB can be used to deploy a wide range of database workloads, including mobile, web, gaming, ad tech, IoT, and machine learning.
• DynamoDB Accelerator (DAX) for in-memory caching.

Here are some additional details about DynamoDB that you may want to know:

• DynamoDB uses a key-value and document data model, supporting both eventually consistent and strongly consistent reads.
• DynamoDB tables are made up of items, which are collections of attribute-value pairs.
• DynamoDB tables can have one or more primary keys, which are used to identify and retrieve items.
• DynamoDB tables can also have secondary indexes (Global Secondary Indexes and Local Secondary Indexes), which are used to query items based on attribute values.
• DynamoDB offers a variety of APIs for accessing and managing data, including the AWS SDKs, the AWS CLI, and the AWS Management Console.

Amazon Redshift

Amazon Redshift is a fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehouse service in the cloud. Redshift makes it simple and cost-effective to analyze all your data using standard SQL and existing BI tools. Redshift is up to 100 times faster than traditional data warehouses, and it offers a variety of features to help you analyze your data, including:

• Massively parallel processing (MPP): Redshift uses MPP to distribute data across multiple compute nodes, allowing it to process large datasets quickly and efficiently.
• Columnar storage: Redshift stores data in columns, which significantly improves performance for analytical queries.
• Advanced Query Optimizer: Optimizes query execution plans for faster results.
• Materialized Views: Pre-compute and store results of complex queries for faster access.
• Concurrency Scaling: Automatically adds capacity to handle concurrent queries.
• Redshift ML: Create, train, and deploy machine learning models directly from Redshift.
• SQL compatibility: Redshift is compatible with standard SQL, so you can use existing BI tools to analyze your data.
• Redshift Serverless: Run and scale data warehouse workloads without managing infrastructure.

Here is some short information about Redshift that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Redshift is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your data warehouse.
• Redshift is up to 100 times faster than traditional data warehouses.
• Redshift is compatible with standard SQL.
• Redshift is cost-effective, and it offers a variety of features to help you save money, such as reserved instances and spot instances.
• Redshift can be used to deploy a wide range of data warehouse workloads, including analytics, business intelligence, and machine learning.

Here are some additional details about Redshift that you may want to know:

• Redshift clusters can be deployed in a variety of sizes, from small clusters for development and testing to large clusters for production workloads.
• Redshift clusters can be scaled up or down (resize) or scaled out (Concurrency Scaling) without downtime.
• Redshift clusters can be backed up automatically to Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3).
• Redshift clusters can be restored from backups to create new Redshift clusters.
• Redshift can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon Athena, Amazon EMR, and Amazon QuickSight.

Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS)

Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS) is a fully managed message queuing service that enables you to decouple and scale microservices, distributed systems, and serverless applications. SQS offers a simple, reliable, and scalable way to decouple and scale distributed systems and microservices. It is a highly available, durable, and scalable hosted queue for storing messages as they travel between applications or microservices. SQS moves data between distributed application components and helps you decouple these components.

Here is some short information about SQS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• SQS is a message queuing service, which means that it stores messages as they travel between applications or microservices.
• SQS is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your queue.
• SQS is highly available and durable, and it can scale to millions of messages per second.
• SQS is cost-effective, and it offers a variety of features to help you save money, such as pay-as-you-go pricing and dead-letter queues.
• SQS can be used to decouple and scale a wide range of applications and microservices, including web applications, mobile applications, and IoT applications.
• SQS can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon Lambda, Amazon SNS, AWS EventBridge, and AWS S3.

Here are some additional details about SQS that you may want to know:

• SQS offers two types of queues: Standard Queues (at-least-once delivery, best-effort ordering) and FIFO Queues (exactly-once processing, strict ordering).
• SQS queues can be configured with different visibility timeouts, which determines how long a message is visible to consumers before it is automatically hidden.
• SQS queues can be configured with dead-letter queues, which are queues where messages are sent if they cannot be processed successfully.
• SQS can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon Lambda, Amazon SNS, AWS EventBridge, and AWS S3.

Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS)

Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS) is a fully managed pub/sub messaging service that enables you to decouple microservices, distributed systems, and serverless applications. SNS provides a simple, reliable, and scalable way to notify multiple subscribers about the availability of new data, such as messages in a queue or events in a database.

Here is some short information about Amazon SNS that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• SNS is a pub/sub messaging service, which means that publishers send messages to topics, and subscribers receive messages from topics.
• SNS is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your messaging infrastructure.
• SNS is highly available and durable, and it can scale to millions of messages per second.
• SNS is cost-effective, and it offers a variety of features to help you save money, such as pay-as-you-go pricing and dead-letter queues.
• SNS can be used to decouple and scale a wide range of applications and microservices, including web applications, mobile applications, and IoT applications.

Here are some additional details about Amazon SNS that you may want to know:

• SNS topics can have multiple subscribers, and subscribers can subscribe to multiple topics.
• SNS messages can be sent in a variety of formats, including JSON, XML, and raw text.
• SNS messages can be encrypted at rest (SSE) and in transit (HTTPS).
• SNS messages can be delivered to a variety of endpoints, including email, SMS, HTTP/S, Amazon SQS queues, AWS Lambda functions, mobile push notifications, and mobile push notifications.
• SNS can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EC2, Amazon Lambda, Amazon CloudWatch, AWS EventBridge, and AWS Kinesis Data Firehose.
• SNS supports FIFO topics for strict message ordering, deduplication, and message grouping.

Amazon API Gateway

Amazon API Gateway is a fully managed service that makes it easy to create, publish, maintain, monitor, and secure APIs at any scale. With API Gateway, you can create REST APIs that access data, applications, and services hosted on AWS or on-premises. API Gateway also provides a variety of features to help you manage your APIs, including:

• API authorization and authentication: You can use API Gateway to authorize and authenticate users of your APIs using a variety of methods, including AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) roles, Amazon Cognito user pools, and OAuth 2.0.
• API monitoring: API Gateway provides detailed metrics (CloudWatch) and logs (CloudWatch Logs, X-Ray) for your APIs, so you can monitor their performance and identify any issues.
• API caching: API Gateway can cache responses to your APIs, which can improve performance and reduce the load on your backend systems.
• API versioning: API Gateway supports API versioning and stages, so you can create new versions of your APIs without breaking existing clients.
• Usage Plans: Control access to your APIs and throttle requests.
• AWS WAF Integration: Protect your APIs from common web exploits.

Here is some short information about API Gateway that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• API Gateway is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your API infrastructure.
• API Gateway supports REST APIs, WebSocket APIs, HTTP APIs (optimized for serverless workloads), and gRPC APIs.
• API Gateway provides a variety of features to help you manage your APIs, including authorization and authentication, monitoring, caching, and versioning.
• API Gateway can be used to create APIs that access data, applications, and services hosted on AWS or on-premises.

Here are some additional details about API Gateway that you may want to know:

• API Gateway APIs are defined using OpenAPI specifications.
• API Gateway APIs can be deployed to production, staging, and test environments using stages.
• API Gateway APIs can be invoked using a variety of tools, including the AWS Console, the AWS CLI, AWS SDKs, and custom clients.
• API Gateway can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as AWS Lambda, Amazon DynamoDB, Amazon S3, AWS Step Functions, and AWS AppSync.
• API Gateway supports private APIs for secure access within a VPC.

Amazon Cognito

Amazon Cognito is a fully managed user identity and access management (IAM) service that allows you to easily add user authentication, authorization, and management to your web and mobile applications. Cognito provides features such as user registration, sign-in, sign-out, password recovery, and access control, so you can focus on building great user experiences.

Cognito can be used to authenticate users with a variety of methods, including:

• Username and password
• Social login (e.g., Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple)
• Multi-factor authentication (MFA) with SMS or TOTP
• Custom authentication schemes (e.g., using AWS Lambda)
• SAML and OIDC federation for enterprise identities

Cognito can also be used to authorize users to access your resources. For example, you can use Cognito to create user groups and roles, and then assign permissions to those groups and roles. This allows you to control who has access to what resources in your application. Cognito integrates with AWS IAM for fine-grained access control.

Cognito is a fully managed service, so you don't have to worry about provisioning, managing, or scaling your IAM infrastructure. Cognito is also highly available and durable, so you can be confident that your users will be able to access your application when they need it.

Here is some short information about Amazon Cognito that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Cognito is a fully managed user identity and access management (IAM) service.
• Cognito can be used to authenticate users with a variety of methods, including username and password, social login, MFA, and custom authentication schemes.
• Cognito can also be used to authorize users to access your resources.
• Cognito is a highly available and durable service.

Here are some additional details about Amazon Cognito that you may want to know:

• Cognito User Pools provide a secure user directory for sign-up and sign-in, managing user profiles, and issuing JWT tokens.
• Cognito Identity Pools (Federated Identities) enable you to grant your users temporary AWS credentials to access AWS services directly.
• Cognito supports various identity providers, including social (Facebook, Google, Apple, Amazon), SAML, and OIDC.
• Cognito authorization can be used to control who has access to what resources in your application through IAM policies.
• Cognito supports user migration for seamless transitions from existing user directories.
• Cognito can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon API Gateway, AWS Lambda, and Amazon S3.

Amazon CloudWatch

Amazon CloudWatch is a monitoring and observability service that provides data and insights in logs, metrics, and events. It collects metrics and logs from all your AWS services, and you can monitor them, visualize the data, and act automatically to changes in these services.

Here is some short information about CloudWatch that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• CloudWatch collects and monitors metrics, logs, and events from all AWS services and resources.
• CloudWatch metrics are numerical values that measure the performance of your AWS resources.
• CloudWatch logs are text files that contain information about the events that occur in your AWS resources.
• CloudWatch events are notifications that are generated by AWS services and resources when certain events occur.
• CloudWatch dashboards allow you to visualize your metrics, logs, and events in real time.
• CloudWatch alarms allow you to be notified when certain conditions are met.

Here are some additional details about CloudWatch that you may want to know:

• CloudWatch metrics can be used to monitor a wide range of performance characteristics, such as CPU utilization, memory usage, and disk I/O.
• CloudWatch Logs can be used to troubleshoot problems, analyze trends, and audit your systems. Log Insights allows for interactive analysis of log data.
• CloudWatch Events (now Amazon EventBridge) can be used to trigger other AWS services and resources, such as Auto Scaling and Lambda, based on events.
• CloudWatch Dashboards can be used to create custom views of your metrics, logs, and events for real-time monitoring.
• CloudWatch Alarms can be used to notify you by email, SMS, or SNS, or trigger automated actions (e.g., Auto Scaling, EC2 actions) when certain conditions are met.
• CloudWatch Contributor Insights helps you find top talkers and identify root causes of performance issues.
• CloudWatch Synthetics allows you to create canaries to monitor your endpoints and APIs.
• CloudWatch Internet Monitor for monitoring internet performance.
• CloudWatch Application Signals for application performance monitoring.

AWS CloudTrail

AWS CloudTrail is a service that enables governance, compliance, operational auditing, and risk mitigation by capturing, logging, storing, and delivering event log files that record API calls made to your AWS account and your resources. With CloudTrail, you can track user activity and API usage across your AWS services and resources.

Here is some short information you will need to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• CloudTrail is a fully managed service that continuously logs all API calls made to your AWS account and your resources.
• CloudTrail logs can be delivered to Amazon S3 and Amazon CloudWatch Logs.
• CloudTrail logs can be used to track user activity, troubleshoot problems, and audit your AWS environment.
• CloudTrail logs can be retained for up to two years.

Here are some additional details that you may want to know:

• CloudTrail logs can be filtered to only include events that are of interest to you.
• CloudTrail logs can be used to create alerts and notifications via CloudWatch Alarms.
• CloudTrail logs can be integrated with other AWS services, such as Amazon IAM, Amazon GuardDuty, and AWS Security Hub.
• CloudTrail Lake allows for immutable storage and SQL-based querying of events.
• CloudTrail Insights for anomaly detection.

Example use cases of CloudTrail:

• Auditing: CloudTrail logs can be used to audit all API calls made to your AWS account and your resources. This can help you to identify any suspicious activity or unauthorized access to your resources.
• Troubleshooting: CloudTrail logs can be used to troubleshoot problems with your AWS resources. For example, if you are experiencing a performance issue, you can review your CloudTrail logs to see what API calls were made leading up to the issue.
• Compliance: CloudTrail logs can be used to help you comply with various industry regulations. For example, if you are subject to HIPAA compliance, you can use CloudTrail logs to track all access to your protected health information (PHI).

AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM)

AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) is a web service that enables you to securely control access to AWS services and resources. Using IAM, you can create and manage AWS users and groups, and use permissions to allow and deny their access to AWS resources.

Here is some short information you will need to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• IAM is a fully managed service that enables you to securely control access to AWS services and resources.
• IAM uses users, groups, and roles to manage access to AWS resources.
• IAM uses identity-based policies (attached to users, groups, roles), resource-based policies (attached to resources like S3 buckets, SQS queues), and access control lists (ACLs) to manage access to AWS resources.
• IAM users are individual people who are authorized to use AWS services and resources.
• IAM groups are collections of IAM users who are assigned the same permissions.
• IAM roles are sets of permissions that can be assigned to IAM users or groups.
• IAM permissions are actions that IAM users or groups are allowed to perform on AWS resources.

Here are some additional details that you may want to know:

• IAM can be used to implement least privilege access, which means that users and groups are only granted the permissions that they need to perform their jobs.
• IAM can be used to implement multi-factor authentication (MFA) for enhanced security.
• IAM can be used to audit all access to your AWS resources using AWS CloudTrail and IAM Access Analyzer.
• IAM Access Analyzer helps identify unintended access to your resources.
• IAM Roles Anywhere allows workloads outside of AWS to use IAM roles.
• IAM supports attribute-based access control (ABAC) for fine-grained permissions.

Example use cases of IAM:

• Creating and managing AWS users and groups: IAM can be used to create and manage AWS users and groups. This allows you to control who has access to your AWS resources and what they can do with them.
• Implementing least privilege access: IAM can be used to implement least privilege access, which means that users and groups are only granted the permissions that they need to perform their jobs. This helps to improve the security of your AWS environment.
• Implementing multi-factor authentication: IAM can be used to implement multi-factor authentication (MFA), which adds an extra layer of security to your AWS account. MFA requires users to enter a code from their mobile phone in addition to their password when logging in.
• Auditing all access to your AWS resources: IAM can be used to audit all access to your AWS resources, so that you can track who is accessing what and when. This information can be used to troubleshoot problems and identify suspicious activity.

AWS Key Management Service (KMS)

AWS Key Management Service (KMS) is a managed service that makes it easy for you to create and control the cryptographic keys that are used to protect your data. KMS provides a range of features that make it easy to manage your keys securely, including:

• Key generation: KMS can generate high-quality cryptographic keys for you.
• Key storage: KMS stores your keys in a highly secure environment.
• Key rotation: KMS can rotate your keys on a regular basis to help protect them from compromise.
• Key auditing: KMS provides detailed auditing of all key operations.

Here is some short information you will need to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• KMS is a managed service that makes it easy to create and control the cryptographic keys that are used to protect your data.
• KMS provides a range of features that make it easy to manage your keys securely, including key generation, key storage, key rotation, and key auditing.
• KMS can be used to encrypt data at rest and in transit.
• KMS encrypts data up to 4KB in size per call. For larger data, use envelope encryption with AWS Encryption Encryption SDK.
• KMS supports custom key stores backed by CloudHSM or external key managers.
• KMS can be used to manage keys for a variety of AWS services, including Amazon S3, Amazon RDS, Amazon EBS, Amazon DynamoDB, and AWS Lambda.
• KMS supports symmetric and asymmetric encryption keys, and HMAC keys.

Here are some additional details that you may want to know:

• KMS uses a variety of security measures to protect your keys, including hardware security modules (HSMs) and encryption.
• KMS is highly available and durable.
• KMS is integrated with a variety of other AWS services.

Example use cases of KMS:

• Encrypting data at rest: KMS can be used to encrypt data at rest in Amazon S3, Amazon RDS, and Amazon EBS. This helps to protect your data from unauthorized access, even if the underlying storage media is compromised.
• Encrypting data in transit: KMS can be used to encrypt data in transit between AWS services. This helps to protect your data from eavesdropping and man-in-the-middle attacks.
• Managing keys for a variety of AWS services: KMS can be used to manage keys for a variety of AWS services, in addition to Amazon S3, Amazon RDS, and Amazon EBS. This includes services such as Amazon CloudFront, Amazon Elasticsearch Service, and Amazon Redshift.

AWS Security Hub

AWS Security Hub provides centralized security governance across AWS accounts with these key exam-relevant features:

• Compliance Standards:
  • PCI DSS v4.0 (latest update)
  • AWS Foundational Security Best Practices (FSBP)
  • CIS AWS Foundations Benchmark
  • NIST SP 800-53
  • ISO 27001
• Automated Findings Correlation: Groups related findings from GuardDuty, Inspector, Macie, IAM Access Analyzer, and other integrated services.
• Security Score: Quantitative measure of compliance status and overall security posture.
• Cross-Region/Account Aggregation: Centralized view of security posture across multiple AWS accounts and regions.
• Integration with AWS Organizations: Manage security at scale across your organization.
• Custom Insights: Create custom queries to identify specific security issues.
• Automated Remediation: Integrate with AWS Systems Manager Automation and AWS Lambda for automated responses.

Here is some short information you will need to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Security Hub is a cloud security posture management service that provides a comprehensive view of your security state across AWS accounts, services, and supported third-party products.
• Security Hub collects findings from a variety of sources, including Amazon GuardDuty, Amazon Inspector, Amazon Macie, and AWS IAM Access Analyzer, and prioritizes them based on severity and risk.
• Security Hub also provides recommendations for remediation, so that you can quickly and easily address any security issues.
• Security Hub can be integrated with other AWS services, such as Amazon EventBridge and Amazon CloudWatch, to automate remediation actions.
• Security Hub supports security controls for AWS services and partner products.

Here are some additional details that you may want to know:

• Security Hub is a regional service. You must enable Security Hub in each region where you want to use it.
• Security Hub can be used to create custom security standards and policies.
• Security Hub can be used to generate reports on your security posture.

Example use cases of Security Hub:

• Identify and remediate security issues: Security Hub aggregates findings across numerous AWS security services (e.g., GuardDuty, Inspector, Macie, IAM Access Analyzer) and partner solutions.
• Meet compliance requirements: Automated compliance checks for various industry standards (e.g., PCI DSS, HIPAA, ISO 27001, NIST).
• Security Automation: Integrated with AWS Systems Manager Automation and AWS Lambda for automated remediation workflows.
• Centralized Security Operations: Provides a single pane of glass for security posture management across your AWS environment.

AWS CloudFormation

AWS CloudFormation is a service that helps you model and set up your AWS infrastructure resources. CloudFormation allows you to use templates to define a collection of AWS resources and the dependencies between them. You can then deploy, update, or delete your infrastructure using a single CloudFormation template.

Here is some short information you will need to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• CloudFormation is a service that helps you model and set up your AWS infrastructure resources.
• CloudFormation uses templates to define a collection of AWS resources and the dependencies between them.
• CloudFormation templates can be written in JSON or YAML.
• CloudFormation templates can be used to deploy, update, or delete your infrastructure in a controlled and repeatable manner.
• CloudFormation can be used to implement best practices, such as infrastructure as code and idempotency, and version control.
• CloudFormation Drift Detection helps identify when your deployed stack configuration differs from its template.
• CloudFormation Hooks allow you to invoke custom logic before or after resource operations.

Here are some additional details that you may want to know:

• CloudFormation templates can be parameterized, allowing you to create reusable templates.
• CloudFormation templates can be nested, allowing you to create complex infrastructure deployments.
• CloudFormation templates can be versioned, allowing you to track changes to your infrastructure over time.
• CloudFormation can be integrated with other AWS services, such as AWS CodePipeline, AWS Systems Manager, and AWS Service Catalog.
• CloudFormation supports resource import to bring existing resources under CloudFormation management.
• CloudFormation supports CloudFormation Guard for policy as code.
• CloudFormation StackSets allow you to deploy CloudFormation stacks across multiple accounts and regions.

Example use cases of CloudFormation:

• Deploying a web application: CloudFormation can be used to deploy a web application, including the Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon RDS databases, and Amazon S3 buckets that are required.
• Creating a development environment: CloudFormation can be used to create a development environment, including the Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon RDS databases, and Amazon S3 buckets that are required.
• Implementing a disaster recovery plan: CloudFormation can be used to implement a disaster recovery plan, including the Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon RDS databases, and Amazon S3 buckets that are required.

AWS Systems Manager

AWS Systems Manager is a service that helps you manage and automate your AWS resources. Systems Manager provides a set of tools and capabilities that can be used to:

• Deploy, manage, and configure applications
• Automate operational tasks
• Collect and analyze data from your infrastructure
• Respond to events and alerts

Here is some short information you will need to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Systems Manager is a fully managed service that helps you manage and automate your AWS resources.
• Systems Manager provides a set of tools and capabilities that can be used to deploy, manage, and configure applications; automate operational tasks; collect and analyze data from your infrastructure; and respond to events and alerts.
• Systems Manager can be used to implement best practices, such as infrastructure as code, configuration management, and continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD).

Here are some additional details that you may want to know:

• Systems Manager includes a variety of features, such as:
• Patch Manager: Helps you manage and deploy software patches to your AWS resources.
• State Manager: Helps you automate the configuration and management of your AWS resources.
• Automation: Helps you create and run scripts to automate operational tasks across your AWS resources.
• Inventory: Provides a detailed inventory of your AWS resources, including software installed and configuration details.
• Parameter Store: Provides a secure, hierarchical storage for configuration data management and secrets.
• Session Manager: Provides secure and auditable instance management without opening inbound ports.
• Patch Manager: Automates patching of operating systems and applications.
• State Manager: Automates the process of keeping your EC2 instances and other AWS resources in a defined state.
• Systems Manager can be integrated with other AWS services, such as AWS Systems Manager Incident Manager, AWS CloudFormation, AWS CodePipeline, and AWS Config.
• Systems Manager supports Run Command for remote execution of commands on instances.

Example use cases of Systems Manager:

• Deploying an application: Systems Manager can be used to deploy an application to a fleet of Amazon EC2 instances.

• Automating patching: Systems Manager can be used to automate the patching of your AWS resources.

• Managing configuration: Systems Manager can be used to manage the configuration of your AWS resources.

• Responding to incidents: Systems Manager can be used to respond to incidents by automatically running scripts to troubleshoot and resolve problems.

AWS Well-Architected Framework

The AWS Well-Architected Framework is a set of guiding principles for designing and operating reliable, secure, efficient, and cost-effective cloud architectures. It consists of six pillars:

• Operational Excellence: Focuses on running and monitoring systems to deliver business value and continuously improve supporting processes and procedures.
• Security: Focuses on protecting information, systems, and assets while delivering business value through risk assessments and mitigation strategies.
• Reliability: Focuses on the ability of a system to recover from infrastructure or service disruptions, dynamically acquire computing resources to meet demand, and mitigate disruptions such as misconfigurations or transient network issues.
• Performance Efficiency: Focuses on using computing resources efficiently to meet system requirements and maintaining that efficiency as demand changes and technologies evolve.
• Cost Optimization: Focuses on avoiding unnecessary costs. This includes understanding and controlling where money is being spent, selecting the most appropriate and right-sized resources, analyzing spend over time, and scaling to meet business needs without overspending.
• Sustainability: Focuses on minimizing the environmental impacts of running cloud workloads. This includes a shared responsibility model for sustainability between AWS and the customer.

AWS Core Services

AWS core services are the foundation of the AWS cloud platform. They provide the basic building blocks for building, deploying, and managing cloud applications. Some of the most important core services include:

• Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2): A web service that provides secure, resizable compute capacity in the cloud.

• Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3): An object storage service that offers industry-leading scalability, data availability, security, and performance.

• Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS): A web service that makes it easy to set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the cloud.

• Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS): A web service that provides block storage volumes for use with EC2 instances.

AWS Networking and Security Services

AWS networking and security services provide the tools you need to build and manage secure networks in the cloud. Some of the most important networking and security services include:

• Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC): A logically isolated section of the AWS cloud where you can launch AWS resources in a private network.

• Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS): A web service that enables you to decouple microservices, distributed systems, and serverless applications.

• Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS): A fully managed message queuing service that enables you to decouple and scale microservices, distributed systems, and serverless applications.

• Amazon Route 53: A highly available and scalable domain name system (DNS) web service.

• AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM): A web service that enables you to securely control access to AWS resources.

AWS Deployment and Management Services

AWS deployment and management services provide the tools you need to deploy, manage, and monitor your cloud applications. Some of the most important deployment and management services include:

• AWS CloudFormation: A service that helps you define and deploy resources in AWS.

• AWS Systems Manager: A collection of tools and services that help you manage your AWS infrastructure and applications.

• AWS CodePipeline: A continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) service that helps you automate your software release process.

• AWS CodeDeploy: A service that helps you deploy, manage, and scale your web and mobile applications.

• AWS CloudWatch: A monitoring and observability service that provides data and insights to help you manage your AWS resources and applications.

AWS Cost Optimization Strategies

AWS cost optimization strategies help you reduce your AWS costs without sacrificing performance or reliability. Some of the most important cost optimization strategies include:

• Choose the right service for the job: Select the most appropriate AWS service for your workload, considering its features, performance, and pricing model.
• Right-size your resources: Continuously analyze and adjust the size of your AWS resources (e.g., EC2 instances, RDS databases) to match your workload's actual needs, avoiding over-provisioning.
• Utilize pricing models effectively:
  • Savings Plans: Flexible pricing model offering significant savings (up to 72%) on EC2, Fargate, and Lambda usage in exchange for a 1-year or 3-year commitment to a consistent amount of compute usage.
  • Reserved Instances (RIs): Offer substantial discounts (up to 75%) compared to On-Demand pricing for a commitment to a specific instance type in a region for 1-year or 3-year terms.
  • Spot Instances: Leverage unused EC2 capacity at steep discounts (up to 90%) for fault-tolerant workloads.
• Implement Cost Allocation Tags: Tag your resources to categorize and track costs across different projects, departments, or environments.
• Monitor and Analyze Costs: Use AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, and AWS Organizations to visualize, manage, and forecast your spending, and identify cost optimization opportunities.
• Automate Cost Control: Implement automation for stopping idle resources, scaling down during off-peak hours, and deleting unneeded resources.
• Leverage Serverless Architectures: Pay only for compute time consumed, eliminating idle capacity costs.
• Optimize Data Transfer Costs: Design architectures to minimize data transfer across regions, Availability Zones, and to the internet.
• Use AWS Compute Optimizer: Get recommendations for right-sizing your compute resources.
• Use AWS Trusted Advisor: Get recommendations for cost optimization, security, performance, fault tolerance, and service limits.
• Consider using cost-effective storage tiers for S3, such as S3 Glacier Flexible Retrieval and S3 Glacier Deep Archive.

Amazon EventBridge

Amazon EventBridge is a serverless event bus that makes it easy to connect applications together using events. It allows you to decouple and scale microservices, serverless applications, and legacy applications. EventBridge can detect events from a variety of sources, including AWS services, applications, and connected devices. It can then route those events to targets such as AWS Lambda functions, Step Functions state machines, Kinesis streams, and Amazon SNS topics.

Here is some short information about Amazon EventBridge that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• EventBridge is a serverless event bus that makes it easy to connect applications together using events.
• It allows you to decouple and scale microservices, serverless applications, and legacy applications.
• EventBridge can detect events from a variety of sources, including AWS services, your custom applications, and SaaS applications (via EventBridge SaaS integrations).
• It can then route those events to targets such as AWS Lambda functions, Step Functions state machines, Amazon Kinesis streams, Amazon SNS topics, and other AWS services.
• EventBridge is a highly scalable and reliable service that can handle millions of events per second with low latency.
• It is also a cost-effective service, as you only pay for the events that you process and deliver.
• EventBridge Schema Registry allows you to discover, manage, and share schemas for events.

Here are some additional details about Amazon EventBridge that you may want to know:

• EventBridge can be used to build a variety of serverless applications, such as real-time data processing pipelines, event-driven architectures, and notification systems.
• It can also be used to integrate AWS services with each other, with your custom applications, and with third-party SaaS applications.
• EventBridge is a powerful tool that can be used to simplify and automate your application architectures, promoting loose coupling and scalability.
• EventBridge Pipes allow you to build point-to-point integrations between event sources and targets with optional filtering and enrichment.
• EventBridge supports API Destinations for invoking HTTP APIs.
• EventBridge supports EventBridge Archive for long-term event storage.

Here is an example of how Amazon EventBridge can be used to build a serverless application:

• You have an application that generates a new event whenever a new customer order is placed.
• You can use EventBridge to create a rule that routes this event to an AWS Lambda function.
• The Lambda function can then process the order and send a confirmation email to the customer.
• You can also use EventBridge to create a rule that routes the event to an Amazon SNS topic.
• This topic can then be used to notify other systems about the new order, such as your inventory system or your CRM system.

This is just one example of how Amazon EventBridge can be used to build serverless applications. EventBridge is a flexible and powerful tool that can be used to solve a wide variety of problems.

AWS Step Functions

AWS Step Functions is a serverless workflow service that makes it easy to coordinate the execution of distributed applications and microservices. It allows you to define workflows as a series of steps, and then Step Functions will take care of executing those steps in the correct order, handling retries and errors automatically.

Here is some short information about AWS Step Functions that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS Step Functions is a serverless workflow service that makes it easy to coordinate the execution of distributed applications and microservices.
• It allows you to define workflows as a series of steps, and then Step Functions will take care of executing those steps in the correct order, handling retries and errors automatically.
• Step Functions can integrate with a variety of AWS services, including AWS Lambda, Amazon S3, Amazon DynamoDB, Amazon SNS, Amazon SQS, and over 200 other AWS services directly.
• Step Functions is a highly scalable and reliable service that can handle millions of workflows per second, with built-in error handling, retries, and parallel execution.
• It is also a cost-effective service, as you only pay for the state transitions and executions.
• Step Functions supports two types of workflows: Standard Workflows (long-running, durable, auditable) and Express Workflows (high-volume, short-duration, event-driven).

Here are some additional details about AWS Step Functions that you may want to know:

• Step Functions workflows are defined using the Amazon States Language, a JSON-based structured language.
• Step Functions workflows can be executed synchronously or asynchronously, depending on the workflow type (Standard or Express).
• Step Functions workflows can be triggered by a variety of events, such as Amazon EventBridge events, S3 object uploads, DynamoDB stream insertions, or AWS Lambda function invocations.
• Step Functions workflows can be monitored and managed using the AWS Management Console, the AWS CLI, AWS SDKs, and integrated with CloudWatch and X-Ray for observability.
• Step Functions Distributed Map allows for processing large datasets with parallel iterations.
• Step Functions supports Workflow Studio for visual workflow design and orchestration.
• Step Functions supports integration with over 200 AWS services, including new service integrations in 2024-2025.

Here is an example of how AWS Step Functions can be used to build a serverless application:

• You have an application that processes images that are uploaded to S3.
• You can use Step Functions to create a workflow that first resizes the image, then converts it to a different format, and then stores it in a different S3 bucket.
• The workflow can be triggered whenever a new image is uploaded to the source S3 bucket.
• Step Functions will take care of executing the steps of the workflow in the correct order, handling retries and errors automatically.

This is just one example of how AWS Step Functions can be used to build serverless applications. Step Functions is a flexible and powerful tool that can be used to solve a wide variety of problems.

Here are some tips for using AWS Step Functions in your AWS applications:

• Use Step Functions to coordinate the execution of distributed applications and microservices.
• Use Step Functions to automate complex workflows, such as order processing, image processing, and data processing.
• Use Step Functions to handle retries and errors automatically.
• Use Step Functions to integrate with a variety of AWS services.
• Use Step Functions to monitor and manage your workflows.

AWS Step Functions is a powerful tool that can be used to simplify and automate your application architectures.

Amazon Kinesis

Amazon Kinesis is a fully managed, scalable, real-time, data streaming service. It can continuously capture and process millions of records per second, making it ideal for a wide range of use cases, such as:

• IoT data processing
• Real-time analytics
• Application monitoring
• Log aggregation

Kinesis consists of three core components:

• Kinesis Data Streams: This service captures and processes streaming data in real time. Data can be ingested into Kinesis Data Streams from a variety of sources, such as IoT devices, web applications, and server logs.
• Kinesis Data Firehose: This service delivers streaming data to data lakes and analytics applications. Kinesis Data Firehose can transform and buffer data before delivering it to its destination, making it easy to integrate with a variety of data processing systems.
• Kinesis Data Analytics: This service makes it easy to process streaming data using Apache Flink and Apache Spark. Kinesis Data Analytics provides a variety of built-in libraries and connectors, making it easy to get started with real-time data processing.

Here is some short information about Amazon Kinesis that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Kinesis Data Streams: A highly scalable and durable real-time data streaming service that can continuously capture and store gigabytes of data per second from hundreds of thousands of sources.
• Kinesis Data Firehose: A fully managed service for delivering real-time streaming data to destinations like Amazon S3, Amazon Redshift, Amazon OpenSearch Service, and Splunk. It can transform, buffer, and compress data before delivery.
• Kinesis Data Analytics: A fully managed service that makes it easy to process and analyze streaming data in real time using Apache Flink or SQL.
• Kinesis Video Streams: A fully managed service that makes it easy to securely stream video from connected devices to AWS for analytics, machine learning (ML), and other processing.

Here are some additional details about Amazon Kinesis that you may want to know:

• Kinesis Data Streams is a durable service that stores data for up to 365 days and can withstand data loss and corruption.
• Kinesis Data Streams is scalable, allowing you to easily adjust shard capacity to handle varying data ingestion rates.
• Kinesis Data Streams is secure, with data encrypted at rest (KMS) and in transit (HTTPS).
• Kinesis Data Firehose is a cost-effective and serverless service for delivering streaming data to various destinations.
• Kinesis Data Analytics is a serverless service that simplifies real-time data processing with built-in connectors and templates.
• Kinesis Video Streams provides secure, durable, and cost-effective storage for video streams.

Amazon Kinesis is a powerful and flexible tool that can be used to build and run a wide variety of real-time data processing applications.

Amazon GuardDuty

Amazon GuardDuty is a threat detection service that uses machine learning to analyze and identify malicious activity in your AWS accounts and workloads. GuardDuty monitors a variety of data sources, including AWS CloudTrail logs, Amazon S3 events, and Amazon VPC flow logs, for signs of suspicious activity. When GuardDuty detects a potential threat, it generates a finding that you can review and investigate.

GuardDuty can help you identify a variety of threats, including:

• Unauthorized access: GuardDuty can detect unauthorized access to your AWS resources, such as unauthorized logins, unauthorized API calls, and unauthorized data access.
• Malware: GuardDuty can detect malware infections on your AWS instances and containers.
• Data exfiltration: GuardDuty can detect unauthorized data exfiltration from your AWS accounts.
• Cryptojacking: GuardDuty can detect unauthorized cryptocurrency mining on your AWS instances and containers.

GuardDuty is a valuable tool for improving the security of your AWS accounts and workloads. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you identify, investigate, and respond to threats.

Here is some short information about Amazon GuardDuty that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• GuardDuty is a threat detection service that uses machine learning to analyze and identify malicious activity in your AWS accounts and workloads.
• GuardDuty monitors a variety of data sources for signs of suspicious activity, including AWS CloudTrail logs, Amazon S3 data events, Amazon VPC flow logs, DNS logs, Kubernetes audit logs (EKS Protection), and Amazon RDS login activity (RDS Protection).
• GuardDuty can help you identify a variety of threats, including unauthorized access, malware, data exfiltration, cryptojacking, and unusual API calls.
• GuardDuty supports multiple AWS accounts through AWS Organizations.

Here are some additional details about Amazon GuardDuty that you may want to know:

• GuardDuty is a managed service, so you do not need to manage any infrastructure.
• GuardDuty can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EventBridge (formerly CloudWatch Events) and Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS), to automate your response to threats.
• GuardDuty is a regional service, but findings can be aggregated to a central account using AWS Security Hub.
• GuardDuty Malware Protection scans EC2 instances and container workloads for malware.

GuardDuty is a powerful tool for improving the security of your AWS accounts and workloads. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you identify, investigate, and respond to threats.

Amazon Inspector

Amazon Inspector is an automated security assessment service that helps you identify and remediate potential security vulnerabilities in your Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) instances and Amazon Elastic Container Service (Amazon ECS) containers.

Inspector uses a variety of assessment techniques, including static code analysis, dynamic analysis, and network analysis, to identify security vulnerabilities. Inspector also provides recommendations on how to remediate the vulnerabilities that it finds.

Inspector is a valuable tool for improving the security of your AWS workloads. It is easy to use and it can help you identify and remediate security vulnerabilities that you may not be aware of.

Here is some short information about Amazon Inspector that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Inspector is an automated security assessment service that helps you identify and remediate potential security vulnerabilities in your Amazon EC2 instances and Amazon ECS containers.
• Inspector uses a variety of assessment techniques to identify security vulnerabilities, including automated agent-based scanning for EC2 instances and agentless scanning for container images in ECR.
• Inspector also provides recommendations on how to remediate the vulnerabilities that it finds, prioritizing them by severity.
• Inspector supports continuous scanning of your environment.

Here are some additional details about Amazon Inspector that you may want to know:

• Inspector is a managed service, so you do not need to manage any infrastructure.
• Inspector can be integrated with AWS Systems Manager for agent deployment and management, and with Amazon EventBridge and AWS Lambda to automate your response to security findings.
• Inspector is available in all AWS Regions and supports multi-account management through AWS Organizations.
• Inspector scans for software vulnerabilities, unintended network exposure, and deviations from security best practices.

Inspector is a powerful tool for improving the security of your AWS workloads. It is easy to use and it can help you identify and remediate security vulnerabilities that you may not be aware of.

Amazon Macie

Amazon Macie is a data security service that uses machine learning to automatically discover, classify, and protect sensitive data in Amazon S3. Macie can help you to identify and protect a wide range of sensitive data types, including personally identifiable information (PII), financial data, intellectual property, and healthcare data.

Macie uses a variety of techniques to discover and classify sensitive data, including:

• Machine learning: Macie uses machine learning to identify patterns in your data that are indicative of sensitive data.
• Natural language processing: Macie uses natural language processing to identify sensitive data in text fields, such as email messages and document files.
• Regular expressions: Macie uses regular expressions to identify sensitive data in specific formats, such as credit card numbers and social security numbers.

Once Macie has identified and classified sensitive data, it provides you with a variety of features to help you to protect it, including:

• Alerts: Macie can generate alerts when it detects sensitive data that is being accessed or shared in a way that violates your security policies.
• Encryption: Macie can help you to encrypt sensitive data at rest and in transit.
• Auditing: Macie can provide you with audit reports on how your sensitive data is being accessed and shared.

Macie is a valuable tool for any organization that is using AWS S3 to store sensitive data. It can help you to identify and protect your sensitive data from unauthorized access, theft, and loss.

Here is some short information about Amazon Macie that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• Macie is a data security service that uses machine learning to automatically discover, classify, and protect sensitive data in Amazon S3.
• Macie can help you to identify and protect a wide range of sensitive data types, including personally identifiable information (PII), financial data, intellectual property, and healthcare data, across your S3 buckets.
• Macie provides a variety of features to help you to protect your sensitive data, including automated sensitive data discovery, alerts, and detailed findings.
• Macie provides a data sensitivity score for your S3 buckets.

Here are some additional details about Amazon Macie that you may want to know:

• Macie can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EventBridge and Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS), to automate your response to sensitive data findings.
• Macie is available in all AWS Regions and supports multi-account management through AWS Organizations.
• Macie provides a dashboard for a centralized view of your S3 data security posture.

Macie is a powerful tool for improving the security of your sensitive data in AWS S3. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you identify, protect, and audit your sensitive data.

AWS IAM Access Analyzer

AWS IAM Access Analyzer is a service that helps you identify, understand, and remediate potential security risks in your AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) policies. Access Analyzer uses graph analysis to analyze your IAM policies and identify potential security risks, such as:

• Excessive permissions: Access Analyzer can identify IAM policies that grant users or roles more permissions than they need.
• Unintended access: Access Analyzer can identify IAM policies that grant users or roles access to resources that they should not have access to.
• Public access: Access Analyzer can identify IAM policies that grant public access to resources.

Access Analyzer also provides you with recommendations on how to remediate the security risks that it identifies.

Here is some short information about AWS IAM Access Analyzer that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS IAM Access Analyzer is a service that helps you identify, understand, and remediate potential security risks in your AWS IAM policies.
• Access Analyzer uses graph analysis to analyze your IAM policies and identify potential security risks, such as excessive permissions, unintended access, and public access.
• Access Analyzer also provides you with recommendations on how to remediate the security risks that it identifies.

Here are some additional details about AWS IAM Access Analyzer that you may want to know:

• Access Analyzer is a managed service, so you do not need to manage any infrastructure.
• Access Analyzer can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as Amazon EventBridge and Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS), to automate your response to security findings.
• Access Analyzer is available in all AWS Regions and supports multi-account analysis through AWS Organizations.

Here are some of the benefits of using AWS IAM Access Analyzer:

• Improved security posture: Access Analyzer can help you to identify and remediate potential security risks in your IAM policies, which can help to improve the security posture of your AWS environment.
• Reduced compliance risk: Access Analyzer can help you to comply with data security regulations by identifying policies that grant unintended access.
• Reduced operational overhead: Access Analyzer is a managed service, so you do not need to manage any infrastructure or develop any custom code to use it.

Overall, AWS IAM Access Analyzer is a valuable tool for any organization that is using AWS. It can help you to improve the security of your AWS environment, reduce your compliance risk, and reduce your operational overhead.

In addition to the above, here are some other things to keep in mind about AWS IAM Access Analyzer:

• Access Analyzer can be used to analyze IAM policies for all types of IAM entities, including users, roles, groups, and services.
• Access Analyzer can be used to analyze IAM policies for all types of AWS resources, including Amazon S3 buckets, Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon RDS databases, and KMS keys.
• Access Analyzer can be used to analyze IAM policies for both new and existing IAM entities and resources.
• Access Analyzer provides findings that highlight resources that are accessible from outside your AWS account.

AWS IAM Access Analyzer is a powerful tool for improving the security of your AWS environment. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you identify, understand, and remediate potential security risks in your IAM policies.

AWS CodePipeline

AWS CodePipeline is a continuous delivery service that helps you automate the release and deployment process for your applications. CodePipeline builds, tests, and deploys your code every time there is a change, so you can release new features more frequently and reliably.

CodePipeline works by modeling and automating the steps required to release your software. You can create a pipeline that includes the following stages:

• Source stage: The source stage retrieves the code from your source code repository, such as AWS CodeCommit, GitHub, Bitbucket, or Amazon S3.
• Build stage: The build stage compiles, packages, and tests your code using services like AWS CodeBuild.
• Test stage: (Optional) The test stage runs additional tests on your code.
• Deploy stage: The deploy stage deploys your code to your production environment using services like AWS CodeDeploy, AWS Elastic Beanstalk, or AWS CloudFormation.

CodePipeline can be integrated with a variety of AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR), AWS Lambda, and AWS CloudFormation. This allows you to use CodePipeline to automate the release and deployment process for a wide range of applications.

Here is some short information about AWS CodePipeline that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS CodePipeline is a continuous delivery service that helps you automate the release and deployment process for your applications.
• CodePipeline works by modeling and automating the steps required to release your software, such as retrieving the code from your source code repository, compiling, packaging, and testing your code, and deploying your code to your production environment.
• CodePipeline can be integrated with a variety of AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon ECR, AWS Lambda, AWS CloudFormation, and AWS CodeStar.

Here are some additional details about AWS CodePipeline that you may want to know:

• CodePipeline is a managed service, so you do not need to manage any underlying infrastructure.
• CodePipeline supports a variety of deployment targets, including Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon ECS clusters, AWS Lambda functions, and on-premises servers.
• CodePipeline provides a variety of features to help you monitor and manage your pipelines, such as real-time status updates, alerts (via SNS), and audit logs (via CloudTrail).
• CodePipeline supports manual approvals at any stage of the pipeline.

Here are some of the benefits of using AWS CodePipeline:

• Increased release frequency: CodePipeline can help you to release new features more frequently by automating the release and deployment process.
• Improved reliability: CodePipeline can help you to improve the reliability of your releases by automating the build, test, and deploy process, reducing human error.
• Reduced risk: CodePipeline can help you to reduce the risk of releasing buggy code by automating the test process and enabling quick rollbacks.
• Improved visibility: CodePipeline provides a variety of features to help you monitor and manage your pipelines, which can help you to identify and resolve problems quickly.

Overall, AWS CodePipeline is a valuable tool for any organization that is developing and deploying software. It can help you to increase your release frequency, improve the reliability of your releases, reduce the risk of releasing buggy code, and improve the visibility of your release process.

In addition to the above, here are some other things to keep in mind about AWS CodePipeline:

• CodePipeline can be used to automate the release and deployment process for applications of all sizes, from small websites to large enterprise applications.
• CodePipeline can be used to automate the release and deployment process for applications that are developed using a variety of programming languages and frameworks.
• CodePipeline can be used to automate the release and deployment process for applications that are deployed to a variety of environments, including on-premises environments, cloud environments, and hybrid environments.
• CodePipeline supports pipeline templates for quick setup.

AWS CodePipeline is a powerful tool for automating the release and deployment process for your applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you improve the frequency, reliability, and risk of your releases.

AWS CodeBuild

AWS CodeBuild is a fully managed continuous integration service that automates the build, test, and packaging of your software. It scales with your needs and helps you to release high-quality software more quickly and reliably.

CodeBuild works by building your code in a Docker container environment, executing the build commands that you specify in your buildspec file. The buildspec file is a YAML file that defines the steps that CodeBuild should take to build and test your code.

CodeBuild can be integrated with a variety of AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon Elastic Container Registry (ECR), and AWS CodePipeline. This allows you to automate the build, test, and deployment process for your applications.

Here is some short information about AWS CodeBuild that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS CodeBuild is a fully managed continuous integration service that automates the build, test, and packaging of your software.
• CodeBuild scales with your needs and helps you to release high-quality software more quickly and reliably.
• CodeBuild works by building your code in a Docker container environment and executing the build commands specified in your buildspec file.
• CodeBuild can be integrated with a variety of AWS services, such as Amazon S3, Amazon ECR, and AWS CodePipeline.

Here are some additional details about AWS CodeBuild that you may want to know:

• CodeBuild supports a variety of build environments, including Docker images for popular programming languages (e.g., Java, Python, Node.js, .NET, Go, Ruby) and custom Docker images.
• CodeBuild provides a variety of features to help you monitor and manage your builds, such as real-time status updates, detailed build logs (CloudWatch Logs), and build notifications (SNS).
• CodeBuild can be used to build and test code for applications of all sizes, from small websites to large enterprise applications.
• CodeBuild supports caching build artifacts in S3 to speed up subsequent builds.
• CodeBuild supports build environment customization with Docker images, including the use of managed and custom images.

Here are some of the benefits of using AWS CodeBuild:

• Increased build frequency: CodeBuild can help you to release new features more frequently by automating the build and test process.
• Improved reliability: CodeBuild can help you to improve the reliability of your releases by providing a consistent build environment and automating the test process.
• Reduced risk: CodeBuild can help you to reduce the risk of releasing buggy code by automating the test process and providing detailed build reports.
• Improved visibility: CodeBuild provides a variety of features to help you monitor and manage your builds, which can help you to identify and resolve problems quickly.

Overall, AWS CodeBuild is a valuable tool for any organization that is developing and deploying software. It can help you to increase your build frequency, improve the reliability of your builds, reduce the risk of releasing buggy code, and improve the visibility of your build process.

In addition to the above, here are some other things to keep in mind about AWS CodeBuild:

• CodeBuild can be used to build and test code for applications that are developed using a variety of programming languages and frameworks.
• CodeBuild can be used to build and test code for applications that are deployed to a variety of environments, including on-premises environments, cloud environments, and hybrid environments.
• CodeBuild can be integrated with a variety of CI/CD tools, such as AWS CodePipeline, Jenkins, and CircleCI.
• CodeBuild supports running builds in a VPC for private network access.

AWS CodeBuild is a powerful and flexible tool for automating the build and test process for your applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you improve the frequency, reliability, and risk of your builds.

AWS CodeDeploy

AWS CodeDeploy is a deployment service that helps you automate application deployments to Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) instances, on-premises instances, serverless applications (AWS Lambda), and Amazon ECS/EKS container services. CodeDeploy makes it easy to reliably deploy code and infrastructure changes to your applications.

CodeDeploy works by deploying your application code to a set of instances or serverless functions. CodeDeploy then routes traffic to the new deployments and monitors the deployment to ensure that it is successful, with options for automatic rollback.

CodeDeploy can be integrated with a variety of AWS services, such as Amazon S3, AWS CloudFormation, and AWS CodePipeline. This allows you to automate the deployment process for your applications.

Here is some short information about AWS CodeDeploy that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS CodeDeploy is a deployment service that helps you automate application deployments to Amazon EC2 instances, on-premises instances, serverless applications (AWS Lambda), and Amazon ECS/EKS.
• CodeDeploy makes it easy to reliably deploy code and infrastructure changes to your applications.
• CodeDeploy works by deploying your application code to a set of instances or functions, routing traffic, and monitoring the deployment for success.
• CodeDeploy can be integrated with a variety of AWS services, such as Amazon S3, AWS CloudFormation, and AWS CodePipeline.

Here are some additional details about AWS CodeDeploy that you may want to know:

• CodeDeploy supports a variety of deployment strategies, such as in-place deployments, blue/green deployments (for EC2/On-Premises and ECS), and linear/canary deployments (for Lambda).
• CodeDeploy provides a variety of features to help you monitor and manage your deployments, such as real-time status updates, deployment events (CloudWatch Events), and audit logs (CloudTrail).
• CodeDeploy can be used to deploy applications of all sizes, from small websites to large enterprise applications.
• CodeDeploy supports automatic rollbacks on deployment failures.
• CodeDeploy supports various deployment strategies, including in-place, blue/green, and canary deployments.

Here are some of the benefits of using AWS CodeDeploy:

• Reduced risk: CodeDeploy can help you to reduce the risk of your deployments by automating the deployment process, providing various deployment strategies, and enabling automatic rollbacks.
• Improved reliability: CodeDeploy can help you to improve the reliability of your deployments by ensuring consistent deployments and minimizing downtime.
• Increased efficiency: CodeDeploy can help you to increase the efficiency of your deployments by automating the deployment process and providing detailed monitoring.

Overall, AWS CodeDeploy is a valuable tool for any organization that is developing and deploying software. It can help you to reduce the risk, improve the reliability, and increase the efficiency of your deployments.

In addition to the above, here are some other things to keep in mind about AWS CodeDeploy:

• CodeDeploy can be used to deploy applications that are developed using a variety of programming languages and frameworks.
• CodeDeploy can be used to deploy applications that are deployed to a variety of environments, including on-premises environments, cloud environments, and hybrid environments.
• CodeDeploy can be integrated with a variety of DevOps tools, such as AWS CodePipeline, Jenkins, and CircleCI.
• CodeDeploy uses an AppSpec file to manage deployment configurations.

AWS CodeDeploy is a powerful and flexible tool for automating the deployment process for your applications. It is easy to use and it provides a variety of features to help you reduce the risk, improve the reliability, and increase the efficiency of your deployments.

AWS CodeCommit

AWS CodeCommit is a fully managed, highly scalable, secure source control service that hosts private Git repositories. CodeCommit makes it easy for teams to collaborate on code development and track changes over time.

CodeCommit is a fully managed service, so you don't need to provision or manage any servers. CodeCommit also provides a variety of security features to help you protect your code, such as encryption at rest and in transit, and integration with AWS IAM for access control.

CodeCommit can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as AWS CodePipeline, AWS CodeDeploy, and AWS CodeBuild. This allows you to automate your software development and deployment process.

Here is some short information about AWS CodeCommit that you will need to know to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate exam:

• AWS CodeCommit is a fully managed, highly scalable, secure source control service that hosts private Git repositories.
• CodeCommit makes it easy for teams to collaborate on code development and track changes over time.
• CodeCommit is a fully managed service, so you don't need to provision or manage any servers.
• CodeCommit provides a variety of security features to help you protect your code, including encryption at rest and in transit.
• CodeCommit can be integrated with a variety of other AWS services, such as AWS CodePipeline, AWS CodeDeploy, and AWS CodeBuild.

Here are some additional details about AWS CodeCommit that you may want to know:

• CodeCommit supports all of the standard Git features, such as branches, commits, pull requests, and merges.
• CodeCommit provides a variety of features to help you manage your repositories, such as branching policies, code review workflows, and notifications.
• CodeCommit can be accessed using a variety of tools, such as the AWS CodeCommit console, the Git CLI, and any Git client.
• CodeCommit integrates with AWS IAM for granular access control to repositories and branches.
• CodeCommit supports pull request and code review workflows.

Here are some of the benefits of using AWS CodeCommit:

• Security: CodeCommit provides a variety of security features to help you protect your code, such as encryption at rest and in transit, and fine-grained access control through IAM.
• Scalability: CodeCommit is a highly scalable service that can handle repositories of any size, from small projects to large enterprise applications.
• Reliability: CodeCommit is a reliable service that is available 24/7, with data replicated across multiple Availability Zones.
• Ease of use: CodeCommit is an easy-to-use service that provides a familiar Git experience and integrates seamlessly with other AWS services.

Overall, AWS CodeCommit is a valuable tool for any organization that is developing and deploying software. It provides a secure, scalable, and reliable way to host your private Git repositories.

In addition to the above, here are some other things to keep in mind about AWS CodeCommit:

• CodeCommit can be used to host repositories for applications of all sizes, from small websites to large enterprise applications.
• CodeCommit can be used to host repositories for applications that are developed using a variety of programming languages and frameworks.
• CodeCommit can be used to host repositories for applications that are deployed to a variety of environments, including on-premises environments, cloud environments, and hybrid environments.
• CodeCommit supports repository triggers for automated actions on code changes.

Contributing

We welcome contributions from the community. If you have ideas, bug reports, or feature requests, please open an issue or submit a pull request.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.