EC2

Question 1

List the Instance Type Families

Answer 1

General Purpose, Compute Optimized, GPU, Memory Optimized, Storage Optimized

Question 2

Which instance type family is balanced for CPU, memory and storage?

Answer 2

General Purpose

Question 3

Which instance type family focuses on high-performing processors?

Answer 3

Compute Optimized

Question 4

Which instance type family is most suitable for graphics intensive applications?

Answer 4

GPU

Question 5

Which instance type family is most suitable for large-scale enterprise applications which hold a lot of data in memory?

Answer 5

Memory Optimized

Question 6

Which instance type family is most suitable for analytic workloads and NoSQL databases?

Answer 6

Storage Optimized

Question 7

List the EC2 purchasing options

Answer 7

On Demand, Spot, Reserved, Dedicated Instances, Dedicated Hosts

Question 8

Describe the characteristics of the EC2 purchasing option: On Demand Instances

Answer 8

1) You pay by the hour, the amount is based on the instance type
2) Best used for irregular and uninterruptible workloads
3) Commonly used for development and test environments

Question 9

Describe the characteristics of the EC2 purchasing option: Reserved Instances

Answer 9

1) You commit to either a 1 or a 3 year term
2) You can pay all up front, partial up front, or no upfront, with correspondingly less discounting
3) Best used for long term, consistent workloads

Question 10

Describe the characteristics of the EC2 purchasing option: Spot Instances

Answer 10

1) You bid for unused EC2 instances
2) Price fluctuates based on demand and is set by AWS
3) No guarantee on how long you will get the instance
4) Possible to get large instances at a low price
5) Best used for interruptible workloads, processing data that can start and stop

Question 11

Describe 3 characteristics of the shared tenancy model

Answer 11

1) Instances are launched on any available host with the necessary resources
2) The same host may be used by multiple customers
3) Security is in place to prevent one instance from accessing another on the same host

Question 12

What is the primary characteristic of a dedicated instance?

Answer 12

It is on a host which can only be used by one customer

Question 13

What does a dedicated host offer above a dedicated instance?

Answer 13

Additional visibility and control for the host itself

Question 14

What is EC2 User Data?

Answer 14

An area where you can enter commands which will be executed when an EC2 instance boots up. Useful for OS updates, versions checks etc.

Question 15

When launching an EC2 instance, what are your options for key pairs?

Answer 15

You can create a new key pair or reuse an existing one

Question 16

What are EC2 System Status checks?

Answer 16

Issues related to the underlying host. Loss of power, network, hardware or software. Faulty components that are AWS’ responsibility. Stop and restart the instance - do not reboot.

Question 17

What are EC2 Instance Status checks?

Answer 17

Issues with the EC2 instance itself. They require the user to troubleshoot the issue. The problems may be incorrect network configuration, out of memory, corrupt files, bad kernel.

Question 18

What are the 6 typical steps for setting up an Elastic Load Balancer?

Answer 18

1) Define the load balancer
2) Assign Security Groups
3) Configure security settings (certificates)
4) Configure health checks
5) Add EC2 instances
6) Add tags

Question 19

What are the primary 2 steps for configuring an Autoscaling Group?

Answer 19

1) Create the launch configuration

2) Configure the group’s policies for scaling and location

Question 20

What are elements of an autoscaling group’s launch configuration?

Answer 20

Selection of the AMI to use, instance types, assignment of IP addresses, storage volume setup, user data, and security groups

Question 21

What is ECS?

Answer 21

EC2 Container Service. This service allows you to run Docker enabled applications packaged as containers across a cluster of EC2 instances without requiring you to manage a complex and administratively heavy cluster management system. The burden of managing your own cluster management system is abstracted with the Amazon ECS Service, by passing that responsibility over to the service itself.