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Intro

Step into the world of AWS with our AWS Exploration Course, where learning meets practical experience through what it takes to develop, deploy, run and manage an e-commerce application powered by AWS

AWS Services Exploration​

The instruction-driven exploration of AWS service(s) gives learners instructions on navigating the AWS Management Console to explore various service options, configuration settings, monitoring capabilities, best practices, etc. The goal is to help learners identify different service features.

Explore how an e-commerce application leverages the AWS Well-Architected Framework pillars and its best practices, learners will navigate through the AWS Management Console to identify and review key services and configurations as well as diagrams to illustrate. This exploration focuses on understanding how the e-commerce application aligns with the five pillars: Operational Excellence, Security, Reliability, Performance Efficiency, and Cost Optimization.

Basic Setup and Configuration​

Objective

Teach learners where to find and explore configuration options for different AWS services.

Example Instructions

  • Accessing Services: Navigate to the Services menu in the AWS Management Console. Locate common services like EC2, S3, and RDS by using the search bar or browsing through categories.
  • Exploring Options: Guide learners to review settings tabs (e.g., "Configuration," "Networking," "Security") to familiarize themselves with available options.
  • Key Areas: Highlight essential areas within each service's dashboard, such as the "Instances" section in EC2 or the "Buckets" section in S3, to locate configuration options.

Troubleshooting​

Objective

Help learners identify where to find logs and troubleshoot common issues in the console.

Example Instructions

  • CloudWatch Logs: Navigate to the CloudWatch service, then to "Logs" to find logs for various services like Lambda and EC2. Show how to select a log group and review log entries.
  • AWS CloudTrail: Guide learners to the CloudTrail service to explore the "Event History" section for tracking API activities.
  • Service Dashboards: Direct learners to each service's dashboard (e.g., EC2, S3) to identify common areas where error messages and status details are displayed, such as the "Instance State" in EC2.

Security Pillar​

Objective

Explore how the application’s security is managed according to AWS best practices.

Sample Instructions

  • Navigate to IAM: Go to Services > IAM. Review the Users, Roles, and Policies sections. Identify how IAM roles are used to grant the e-commerce application least privilege access to necessary resources.
  • Check Encryption and Access Control in S3: Go to Services > S3 and select the relevant buckets used by the application (e.g., for storing product images). In the bucket's Properties, check if Server-Side Encryption is enabled. In the Permissions tab, review the bucket policies and access control lists (ACLs) to ensure secure access management.
  • Explore VPC for Network Security: Navigate to Services > VPC. Browse the Security Groups and Network ACLs sections to review network-level access controls. Look for how the application isolates its components within private subnets for security.
  • Review AWS Security Hub and GuardDuty: Go to Services > Security Hub and GuardDuty. Explore the dashboard to identify security findings, compliance status, and security best practices applied to the application.

Operational Excellence Pillar​

Objective

Understand how the e-commerce application supports operational excellence through monitoring, automation, and infrastructure management.

Sample Instructions

  • Navigate to AWS CloudFormation: Go to Services > CloudFormation. In the "Stacks" section, review the application’s infrastructure stack. This will help you understand how the application’s resources are managed as code, enabling consistent and repeatable deployments.
  • Review CloudWatch for Monitoring: Go to Services > CloudWatch. Browse through Metrics, Logs, and Alarms to see how the application is monitored. Look for custom metrics related to application performance and health checks to understand how operational visibility is maintained.
  • Explore AWS Systems Manager: Navigate to Services > Systems Manager. Explore features like Automation, Run Command, and Patch Manager to see how routine maintenance, patching, and automated workflows contribute to operational excellence.
  • AWS Trusted Advisor: Show how to access Trusted Advisor from the console and review its dashboard to identify potential cost, security, and performance recommendations.
  • Automated Backups: In services like RDS, guide learners to the "Snapshots" or "Backups" sections to see how backups are managed.
  • Health Checks: Navigate to Route 53 and ELB services to explore health check configurations, pointing out where monitoring information can be reviewed.

Reliability Pillar​

Objective

Identify how the application maintains reliability, including high availability and fault tolerance.

Sample Instructions

  • Explore Amazon RDS for Database Redundancy: Go to Services > RDS. Select the database instance used by the application. Check if Multi-AZ Deployment is enabled, indicating that the database is set up for automatic failover and high availability.
  • Check Load Balancing and Auto Scaling: Navigate to Services > EC2, then go to Auto Scaling Groups. Review the configuration to understand how the application scales its EC2 instances in response to demand.
  • Under EC2, go to Load Balancers to see if an Application Load Balancer (ALB) or Network Load Balancer (NLB) is set up to distribute incoming traffic, enhancing availability.
  • Review S3 for Data Durability: In S3, select the buckets used for static content or data storage. In the Properties tab, check the Versioning setting to see if it is enabled for object recovery in case of accidental deletions or overwrites.

Performance Efficiency Pillar​

Objective

Explore how the application is designed for optimal performance, including scalability and efficient use of resources.

Samnple Instructions

  • Explore Amazon CloudFront for Content Delivery: Go to Services > CloudFront. Review the distributions configured for the application. Note how content caching and global edge locations are used to improve content delivery speeds for users worldwide.
  • Check EC2 Instance Types: Navigate to Services > EC2 and select the instances running the application. Review the instance types to understand if they are optimized for the workload (e.g., compute-optimized, memory-optimized).
  • Explore DynamoDB and Caching: Go to Services > DynamoDB to review the tables used by the application. Check the Read/Write Capacity Mode (on-demand or provisioned) to see how the database scales based on traffic.
  • Navigate to Services > ElastiCache (if used) to explore how caching is implemented to reduce database load and enhance performance.

Cost Optimization Pillar​

Objective

Identify how the application manages costs through resource optimization and monitoring.

Sample Instructions

  • Navigate to AWS Cost Explorer: Go to Services > Billing, then select Cost Explorer. Review cost breakdowns by service, region, or usage type to identify the application’s main cost drivers. Look for cost trends that suggest over-provisioning or under-utilization of resources.
  • Check Reserved Instances and Savings Plans: In the Billing console, explore the "Savings Plans" and "Reserved Instances" sections to see if the application leverages these options for cost savings on EC2, RDS, and other resources.
  • Review S3 Storage Class: Go to Services > S3 and check the storage class of the objects stored (Standard, Infrequent Access, Glacier). Confirm that appropriate storage classes are used to optimize costs based on access patterns.
  • Explore Trusted Advisor: Navigate to Services > Trusted Advisor. Review the "Cost Optimization" section for recommendations on unused or underutilized resources, suggesting areas where costs can be further reduced.

Exploration Driven By E-commerce Application User Actions​

This exploration showcases how various user actions, such as product searches, viewing product recommendations, managing wishlists, submitting reviews, and interacting with the shopping cart, are supported by various AWS services. Through navigation of the AWS Management Console and accompanying diagram illustrations, learners will understand how these services seamlessly integrate to fulfill customer requests. The following are examples of some common user interactions:

Objective

Explore how the application processes product search queries.

Sample Navigation and Explanation

  • Amazon OpenSearch (Elasticsearch): Go to Services > Amazon OpenSearch Service. Review how the search index is configured to store and retrieve product information efficiently. Navigate to the Indices section to understand how product data is structured for quick searches.
  • API Gateway and Lambda: Navigate to API Gateway and find the endpoint handling product search requests. Explore the integration with AWS Lambda by navigating to Lambda > Functions and selecting the search function to review how it processes search terms and queries the OpenSearch index.

View Product Recommendations​

Objective

Understand how product recommendations are generated and presented to users.

Sample Navigation and Explanation

  • Amazon DynamoDB: Go to Services > DynamoDB and select the table storing product recommendations (e.g., trending, top-rated, or personalized recommendations). Review how data is stored using keys and indexes to enable quick lookups.
  • AWS Personalize: If using Amazon Personalize for machine learning-based recommendations, navigate to Personalize to explore how recommendation models are trained and deployed.
  • Lambda and API Gateway: In API Gateway, identify the endpoint serving product recommendations. Review the associated Lambda function to understand how it fetches recommendations from DynamoDB or Amazon Personalize and returns them to the frontend.

Wishlist Management​

Objective

Explore how users add or remove products from their wishlist.

Samnple Navigation and Explanation

  • Amazon DynamoDB: Navigate to DynamoDB and locate the table storing wishlist items. Review how wishlist items are linked to individual users using a unique customer ID.
  • API Gateway and Lambda: In API Gateway, identify the wishlist management endpoints. Go to Lambda > Functions and select the function responsible for adding or removing items in the wishlist table, highlighting how the function interacts with DynamoDB.

Product Reviews​

Objective

Examine how users can submit and view product reviews.

Sample Navigation and Explanation

  • DynamoDB: Navigate to the DynamoDB service and review the table containing product reviews, including fields for customer IDs, product IDs, ratings, and comments.
  • S3 for Review Images: Go to S3 and locate the bucket where review images are stored. Review the Bucket Policy to see how access is controlled for uploading and viewing images.
  • API Gateway and Lambda: In API Gateway, explore the endpoint handling review submissions. Navigate to the Lambda function associated with review processing to see how it writes review data to DynamoDB and stores images in S3.

Shopping Cart​

Objective

Understand how the shopping cart is managed and how product details are retrieved.

Sample Navigation and Explanation

  • DynamoDB: In DynamoDB, select the table used to store shopping cart items. Review how the table is designed to track items by customer ID, product ID, and quantity.
  • Lambda Functions: Navigate to Lambda > Functions and select the functions responsible for adding, updating, and removing items from the cart. Explore how these functions interact with DynamoDB to modify cart contents and retrieve product information.
  • Integration with Product Service: Review how the cart Lambda function may call an external product service (through API Gateway) to fetch up-to-date product details such as pricing, availability, and images.