Content Domain 4: Design Cost-Optimized Architectures
Tasks
Task 4.1: Design cost-optimized storage solutions
Knowledge of:
Access options (for example, an S3 bucket with Requester Pays object storage)
AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing)
AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report)
AWS storage services with appropriate use cases (for example, Amazon FSx, Amazon EFS, Amazon S3, Amazon EBS)
Backup strategies
Block storage options (for example, hard disk drive [HDD] volume types, solid state drive [SSD] volume types)
Data lifecycles
Hybrid storage options (for example, DataSync, Transfer Family, Storage Gateway)
Storage access patterns
Storage tiering (for example, cold tiering for object storage)
Storage types with associated characteristics (for example, object, file, block)
Skills in:
Designing appropriate storage strategies (for example, batch uploads to Amazon S3 compared with individual uploads)
Determining the correct storage size for a workload
Determining the lowest cost method of transferring data for a workload to AWS storage
Determining when storage auto scaling is required
Managing S3 object lifecycles
Selecting the appropriate backup and/or archival solution
Selecting the appropriate service for data migration to storage services
Selecting the appropriate storage tier
Selecting the correct data lifecycle for storage
Selecting the most cost-effective storage service for a workload
Task 4.2: Design cost-optimized compute solutions
Knowledge of:
AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing)
AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report)
AWS global infrastructure (for example, Availability Zones, AWS Regions)
AWS purchasing options (for example, Spot Instances, Reserved Instances, Savings Plans)
Distributed compute strategies (for example, edge processing)
Hybrid compute options (for example, AWS Outposts, AWS Snowball Edge)
Instance types, families, and sizes (for example, memory optimized, compute optimized, virtualization)
Optimization of compute utilization (for example, containers, serverless computing, microservices)
Scaling strategies (for example, auto scaling, hibernation)
Skills in:
Determining an appropriate load balancing strategy (for example, Application Load Balancer [Layer 7] compared with Network Load Balancer [Layer 4] compared with Gateway Load Balancer)
Determining appropriate scaling methods and strategies for elastic workloads (for example, horizontal compared with vertical, EC2 hibernation)
Determining cost-effective AWS compute services with appropriate use cases (for example, Lambda, Amazon EC2, Fargate)
Determining the required availability for different classes of workloads (for example, production workloads, non-production workloads)
Selecting the appropriate instance family for a workload
Selecting the appropriate instance size for a workload
Task 4.3: Design cost-optimized database solutions
Knowledge of:
AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing)
AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report)
Caching strategies
Data retention policies
Database capacity planning (for example, capacity units)
Database connections and proxies
Database engines with appropriate use cases (for example, heterogeneous migrations, homogeneous migrations)
Database replication (for example, read replicas)
Database types and services (for example, relational compared with non-relational, Aurora, DynamoDB)
Skills in:
Designing appropriate backup and retention policies (for example, snapshot frequency)
Determining an appropriate database engine (for example, MySQL compared with PostgreSQL)
Determining cost-effective AWS database services with appropriate use cases (for example, DynamoDB compared with Amazon RDS, serverless)
Determining cost-effective AWS database types (for example, time series format, columnar format)
Migrating database schemas and data to different locations and/or different database engines
Task 4.4: Design cost-optimized network architectures
Knowledge of:
AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing)
AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report)
Load balancing concepts (for example, Application Load Balancer)
NAT gateways (for example, NAT instance costs compared with NAT gateway costs)
Network connectivity (for example, private lines, dedicated lines, VPNs)
Network routing, topology, and peering (for example, AWS Transit Gateway, VPC peering)
Network services with appropriate use cases (for example, DNS)
Skills in:
Configuring appropriate NAT gateway types for a network (for example, a single shared NAT gateway compared with NAT gateways for each Availability Zone)
Configuring appropriate network connections (for example, Direct Connect compared with VPN compared with internet)
Configuring appropriate network routes to minimize network transfer costs (for example, Region to Region, Availability Zone to Availability Zone, private to public, Global Accelerator, VPC endpoints)
Determining strategic needs for content delivery networks (CDNs) and edge caching
Reviewing existing workloads for network optimizations
Selecting an appropriate throttling strategy
Selecting the appropriate bandwidth allocation for a network device (for example, a single VPN compared with multiple VPNs, Direct Connect speed)