Percent of Exam 15%
Domain Focus Areas
- Demonstrate ability to architect the appropriate level of availability based on stakeholder requirements
- Demonstrate ability to implement DR for systems based on RPO and RTO
- Determine appropriate use of multi-Availability Zones vs. multi-Region architectures
- Demonstrate ability to implement self-healing capabilities
- Content may include the following: High Availability vs. Fault Tolerance
AWS Services
- Storage Gateway
- Import/Export
- Backups
- DR and BC for Databases
AWS Documentation
- Using Amazon Web Services and DFS Replication for Disaster Recovery of File Servers
- https://d0.awsstatic.com/whitepapers/implementing-windows-file-server-disaster-recovery.pdf
- Enterprise Backup and Recovery On-Premises to AWS
- https://d0.awsstatic.com/whitepapers/best-practices-for-backup-and-recovery-on-prem-to-aws.pdf
- Backup and Recovery Approaches Using AWS
- https://d0.awsstatic.com/whitepapers/Backup_Archive_and_Restore_Approaches_Using_AWS.pdf
- Using AWS for Disaster Recovery
- https://d0.awsstatic.com/whitepapers/aws-disaster-recovery.pdf
- Migrating AWS Resources to a New Region
- https://d0.awsstatic.com/whitepapers/aws-migrate-resources-to-new-region.pdf
- Import/Export FAQ
- https://aws.amazon.com/importexport/faqs/
- Import/Export Disk FAQ
- http://aws.amazon.com/importexport/disk/faqs/
- Storage Gateway FAQ
- https://aws.amazon.com/storagegateway/faqs/
- Using OpsWorks Auto Healing
- http://docs.aws.amazon.com/opsworks/latest/userguide/workinginstances-autohealing.html
AWS Presentations
- How to Enable Disaster Recovery and Migrate to AWS
- https://youtu.be/NoSwvJ18tMM
- Deploying a Disaster Recovery Site on AWS
- https://youtu.be/bXrGUlgbl-s
- Rapid Recovery Solution for Disaster Recovery
- https://youtu.be/5hCAwEQpWNc
- Multi-Region Application Using Amazon VPC
- https://youtu.be/xA97GUzLAls
- Deploy High Availability & Disaster Recovery Architectures with AWS
- https://youtu.be/XU6KDBQiwEM
- Introducing AWS Solutions for Backup and Archiving
- https://youtu.be/zYI4Gx0D54U
- AWS Storage Gateway: Secure, Cost-Effective Backup & Archive
- https://youtu.be/VmjDfz-MIZE
3rd Party Docs
3rd Party Presentations
- Disaster Recovery for VMware, Hyper-V, and AWS
- http://www.zerto.com/disaster-recovery-for-vmware-hyper-v-and-aws-that-actually-works/
Next Amazon Web Services Certified Solutions Architect – Professional Study Guide section
- Introduction
- High Availability and Business Continuity
- Costing
- Deployment Management
- Network Design
- Data Storage
- Security
- Scalability and Elasticity
- Cloud Migration and Hybrid Architecture
Hybrid ArchitectureThe Amazon Web Services Certified Solutions Architect Professional certification is the Professional level cert beyond the CSA Associate exam. AWS currently offers two Pro level certs – Architect and DevOps – and these are the highest certification levels at this time. I decided to pursue the CSA Pro cert to set myself apart from other AWS architects and to help Catapult achieve the next level of AWS partner status.
Here is the candidate profile from the certification blueprint and AWS CSA site:
- Achieved AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate
- Two or more years hands-on experience designing and deploying cloud architecture on AWS.
- Abilities to evaluate cloud application requirements and make architectural recommendations for implementation, deployment, and provisioning applications on AWS
- Identify and gather requirements in order to define a solution to be built on AWS
- Evolve systems by introducing new services and features
- Assess the tradeoffs and implications of architectural decisions and choices for applications deployed in AWS
- Design an optimal system by meeting project requirements while maximizing characteristics such as scalability, security, reliability, durability, and cost effectiveness
- Evaluate project requirements and make recommendations for implementation, deployment, and provisioning applications on AWS
- Provide best practice and architectural guidance over the lifecycle of a project
As part of my preparation for the AWS CSA Pro certification I compiled lists of documentation and seminars to cover the 8 separate exam focus areas. I will have a separate blog post containing the exam prep material for each functional area. Follow the links below to the functional area posts.
- High Availability and Business Continuity
- Costing
- Deployment Management
- Network Design
- Data Storage
- Security
- Scalability and Elasticity
- Cloud Migration and Hybrid Architecture
All of the material I compiled in each area is free, but there are paid training courses, labs, and practice exams available as well. I am using the Solution Architect – Professional course from ACloudGuru as a supplement and the practice exam from Kryterion.
Instructor-led classes:
- Advanced Architecting on AWS. This course is available from AWS and Global Knowledge. I attended the Associate course from Global Knowledge in 2014, but I did not have 3 days I could set aside for the training right now.
- ACloud.Guru Certified Solutions Architect – Professional. I needed something I could split up over evenings, weekends, and plane flights so I went with Ryan’s course.
Practice Exam
- WebAssessor Practice Exam. I had a voucher for a free practice exam that expired last year, so I took this as a pre-study assessment after a few evenings of studying. One of the reasons I broke up the study guide by section is so that I could focus on weak areas identified by the practice exam.
Labs
- Personal AWS Account. You should have your own AWS account by now. If not, go sign up for the free tier.
- qwikLABS. QwikLabs offers a Solutions Architect – Professional lab bundle. They also offer free introductory labs, although I doubt they will be deep enough for the Pro certification. The introductory labs may be enough if you are using these guides for the Associate exam.
These posts are meant to supplement your studies for the professional certification. I obviously cannot guarantee you will pass the exam, and this material may not cover all of the features on the exam. AWS introduces about 10 service or feature updates a week, and although it may take months for these features to show up in the exam, they can show up at any time. I tried only to use presentations and documentation from 2014 – present.
This material is meant for the Professional cert, but it can be used for the Associate exam if you want to skip some of the deep dive and masterclass presentations.
Over the last three to four years, as the concept of digital transformation took hold and the Cloud continued to redefine business ecosystems, I began to see that we needed to change our traditional approach of servicing our customers. The tools we used, the skills we needed, those things needed to change because our clients needed more – they needed a partner who could break down the barriers to business innovation rather than defaulting to technology as a standalone fix.
So I embarked upon a transformation journey, telling our teams that we needed to do things differently, and that we needed to bring a totally different perspective and value proposition to our customers. With the excitement of redefining our to-customer value, we didn’t really take the time to change a whole lot of other things, like how we measure our business or how we redefine our structure or how we change our processes to align to our new vision. As a result, as we went through the transition we realized that we were having some challenges with creating the success we wanted. As I reflected upon this I kept coming back to, well we’re asking a lot of people to change, but we as the leadership – me, in particular – were not changing. I wasn’t thinking about how I should manage and measure the business differently or how I could cultivate the culture in the business in the context of what might be needed in this new world, versus what worked really well for me in the past and helped me to be successful.
I realized that one of the very first things I had to do was educate myself. That meant setting aside time every day to read white papers and perspectives from thought leaders in the industry on transformation in technology and how to enable it. I dug in and leveraged the collective knowledge of my peer group and where they were on their transformation journey. I committed myself to knowing and understanding what we were trying to bring value to at a much lower level than I have in several years. Then I challenged my team to do the same, so we would have conversations about the kinds of things we were trying to accomplish rather than relying on what we used to do. The goal here was to create a team of leaders that transformed themselves before we started telling everyone else they needed to transform. The change had to come from the top down, not the bottom up.
Once we had a handle on what we needed to do to bring services to our customers in a new way, we looked at how we should measure the business. We needed different key performance indicators (KPIs) that would allow us to not just measure performance, but the outcome of this journey as well. We kept in place the traditional KPIs – our financial situation, health and cash flow – because they all still have value. But we had to re-think key business metrics in terms of progress and how we positioned and measured business success. Our primary concern was not allowing ourselves to fall back into the old ways when we started to feel tension in the system, which is a natural tendency. This a constant battle that we still find ourselves struggling with today.
Looking back, we started out by telling everyone in the organization to change, but it couldn’t really happen until those of us at the top changed first and formulated the vision for the rest of the organization. It was critical that we didn’t change things in silos. In this new era, everything is about a highly collaborative and integrated approach, from recruiting, to sales, to our service lines and our partnerships. It had to be a collective experience and our job as the executive team was to bring all of it together to facilitate a lasting and holistic transformation.
Transformation starts at the top, but where does it go from there? It’s a journey. Read part 2 of this series, “Transformation is a Journey, Not a Destination,” here.