AWS Architecting & Ecosystem

• AWS Architecting \& Ecosystem
  • Well Architected Framework General Guiding Principles
  • AWS Cloud Best Practices - Design Principles
  • Well Architected Framework 6 Pillars
    • 1. Operational Excellence
    • 2. Security
    • 3. Reliability
    • 4. Performance Efficiency
    • 5. Cost Optimization
    • 6. Sustainability
  • AWS Well-Architected Tool
  • AWS Right Sizing
  • AWS Ecosystem - Free Resources
    • AWS Ecosystem - AWS Support
  • AWS Marketplace

Well Architected Framework General Guiding Principles

• Stop guessing capacity needs.
• Test systems at production scale.
• Automate to facilitate architectural experimentation.
• Allow for evolutionary architectures based on changing requirements.
• Drive architectures using data.
• Improve through game days by simulating applications for flash sale days.

AWS Cloud Best Practices - Design Principles

• Scalability: Scale both vertically and horizontally.
• Disposable Resources: Servers should be disposable and easily configured.
• Automation: Utilize serverless, infrastructure as a service, and auto-scaling.
• Loose Coupling: Break monolithic applications into smaller, loosely coupled components to prevent cascading failures.
• Services, Not Servers: Use managed services, databases, and serverless options instead of just EC2.

Well Architected Framework 6 Pillars

1. Operational Excellence

• Ability to run and monitor systems for business value and improve supporting processes.
• Design Principles:
  • Perform operations as code (Infrastructure as code).
  • Automate the creation of annotated documentation.
  • Make frequent, small, reversible changes.
  • Refine operations procedures frequently and ensure team familiarity.
  • Anticipate failure.
  • Learn from all operational failures.

2. Security

• Ability to protect information, systems, and assets while delivering business value through risk assessments and mitigation strategies.
• Design Principles:
  • Implement a strong identity foundation (centralized privilege management, principle of least privilege, IAM).
  • Enable traceability (integrate logs and metrics with systems).
  • Apply security at all layers (edge network, VPC, load balancer, instances, OS, application).
  • Automate security best practices.
  • Protect data in transit and at rest (encryption, tokenization, access control).
  • Keep people away from data (reduce or eliminate direct access).
  • Prepare for security events (run incident response simulations, use automation).

3. Reliability

• Ability to recover from disruptions, dynamically acquire resources, and mitigate misconfigurations or transient network issues.
• Design Principles:
  • Test recovery procedures using automation.
  • Automatically recover from failures.
  • Scale horizontally to increase availability.
  • Stop guessing capacity (use Auto Scaling).
  • Manage change with automation.

4. Performance Efficiency

• Efficiently use computing resources to meet system requirements and maintain efficiency as demands change.
• Design Principles:
  • Democratize advanced technologies (use services).
  • Go global in minutes (deploy in multiple regions).
  • Use serverless architectures.
  • Experiment frequently.
  • Be aware of all AWS services (mechanical sympathy).

5. Cost Optimization

• Deliver business value at the lowest price point.
• Design Principles:
  • Adopt a consumption model (pay for what you use).
  • Measure overall efficiency (use CloudWatch).
  • Stop spending on data center operations (focus on projects).
  • Analyze and attribute expenditure (use tags to measure ROI).
  • Use managed services to reduce costs.

6. Sustainability

• Minimize environmental impacts of running cloud workloads.
• Design Principles:
  • Understand your impact (establish performance indicators).
  • Set sustainability goals for each workload.
  • Maximize utilization (right size workloads).
  • Anticipate and adopt new efficient technologies.
  • Use managed services to automate sustainability best practices.
  • Reduce downstream impact (minimize energy/resources for services).

AWS Well-Architected Tool

• Free tool to review architectures against the 6 pillars and adopt best practices.
• How it works:
  • Select your workload and answer questions.
  • Review answers against the 6 pillars.
  • Obtain advice: videos, documentation, reports, and dashboards.

AWS Right Sizing

• Match instance types and sizes to workload performance and capacity requirements at the lowest cost.
• Right sizing involves starting small and scaling up easily, continuously adjusting after cloud onboarding, and using tools like CloudWatch, Cost Explorer, and Trusted Advisor.

AWS Ecosystem - Free Resources

• AWS Blogs: AWS Blogs
• AWS Forums: AWS Forums
• AWS Whitepapers & Guides: AWS Whitepapers & Guides
• AWS Quick Starts: AWS Quick Starts
  • Automated, gold-standard deployments in the AWS Cloud.
  • Examples: WordPress on AWS, leveraging CloudFormation.
• AWS Solutions: AWS Solutions
  • Vetted technology solutions for the AWS Cloud.
  • Example - AWS Landing Zone (secure, multi-account environment).

AWS Ecosystem - AWS Support

DEVELOPER	BUSINESS	ENTERPRISE
Business hours email access to Cloud Support Associates	24x7 phone, email, and chat access to Cloud Support Engineers	Access to a Technical Account Manager (TAM)
General guidance: < 24 business hours	Production system impaired: < 4 hours	Concierge Support Team (for billing and account best practices)
System impaired: < 12 business hours	Production system down: < 1 hour	Business-critical system down: < 15 minutes

AWS Marketplace

• Digital catalog with thousands of software listings from independent software vendors.
• Examples:
  • Custom AMIs, CloudFormation templates, SaaS, containers.
• Purchases go into your AWS bill.
• You can sell your own solutions on the AWS Marketplace.