AWS Interview Questions and Answers for 2023

An online platform called Amazon Web Service offers scalable and affordable cloud computing solutions. On-demand services like compute power, database storage, content distribution, etc. are available to enterprises thanks to the widely used cloud computing platform AWS. Whether you are a beginner or an intermediate or an experienced AWS professional, this guide will help you to increase your confidence and knowledge in AWS. The questions are divided into various categories such as AWS fundamentals, security, network and storage, deployment and automation, and database. The guide also provides step-by-step explanations for each question, which helps you to understand the concepts in detail. With AWS Interview Questions, you can be confident that you will be well-prepared for your next interview. So, if you are looking to advance your career in AWS, these AWS Interview Questions is the perfect resource for you. Don't wait any longer, start preparing for your AWS interview today!

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Beginner

The three major types of cloud services in AWS are:

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) 

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is essentially made up of the fundamental components of the cloud that give us access to a wide range of networking capabilities, virtual and high-quality hardware computing resources, security, and space for backup and data storage. IaaS is a popular option for cloud computing services due to its resemblance to current technology resources that developers and internal experts already utilize. The most flexibility and management control of newly acquired and current resources can be done with IaaS. 

Platform as a Service (Paas) 

Platform as a Platform (PaaS) offers us a platform that is hosted by the service provider and is outfitted with the best hardware and software tools. The necessity to handle the intricate hardware and operating system infrastructure is removed with PaaS. It enables us to concentrate on the creation, administration, and deployment of our applications. 

Software as a Service (Saas) 

The best way to understand Software as a Service (SaaS) is to look at email services like Gmail. Users of email send and receive messages without giving servers, feature improvements, application management, or maintenance a second thought. We are not required to think about which operating systems are required to run email apps. Users that use SaaS can access technological goods and services without worrying about setup or administration. SaaS stands for user applications for a certain piece of software without the hassle of infrastructure.

This is a frequently asked AWS interview question when it comes to the first round of technical interviews.

When moving an application to AWS, there are a few important factors to take into account: 

  1. Computing Resources: How will my application be hosted in terms of computing resources? Will I use containers or EC2 instances? Which instance types will I require? Which database, and in what size, will I use? 
  2. Storage: What data will be stored? – How can I get to it? Will I have to utilize EFS, EBS, or Amazon S3? 
  3. Resources for Networking: How will my application be able to access the internet? How many firewall rules will I require? Do I require a Direct Connect or VPN connection? 
  4. Resources for Security: My application will be safeguarded in what way? What kind of identification and permission will I require? What resources are required to safeguard my application from malware and DDoS attacks? 
  5. Resources for Management and Monitoring: How will I manage and watch over my application? What equipment do I need to make sure my application is operating properly? 

The following are the main parts of AWS:

  1. Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2): It is an on-demand computing resource for hosting applications. EC2 is useful when demands are unpredictable. 
  2. Route 53: It is a DNS service available online. 
  3. AWS S3: AWS Identity and Access Management frequently use the storage device service known as Simple Storage Device S3. 
  4. AWS Cloud Watch: You can use cloud watch to keep an eye on AWS's crucial areas and even create a reminder for troubleshooting. 
  5. Elastic Block Store: It is linked with EC2 and enables us to store consistent quantities of data. Additionally, it enables data persistence. 
  6. Simple Email Service: We can send emails using the Simple Email Service by using either a restful API request or standard SMTP. 

Expect to come across this popular AWS Solution Architect interview question.

AWS uses distinct geographical regions called AWS Regions to house its infrastructure. These are dispersed globally so that we can host their cloud infrastructure in the area that is nearest to us. To minimize network latency for your end users, the closer our region is to us, the better. For quick service, we need to be close to the data centers.

An AWS Region is composed of logical units called AWS Availability Zones (AZs). There are now 69 AZs, which are remote places within a region that serves as data centers. Each region has numerous AZs, so designing our infrastructure to have backups of our data in other AZs is a very effective way to establish resiliency, which is a fundamental idea in cloud computing.

A dynamic cloud computing solution, elastic IP (EIP) addresses are more like static IPv4 addresses. These IPs are mostly used to hide instances or software failures from AWS account. Remapping the address to another instance that is as fast made available in our account does this. Our AWS account will instantly receive an IP address, which is ours until we want to surrender it. However, we have the option to add the IP to a DNS record for our domain. This will guarantee that our instance is the default gateway for the specified domain.

Application performance is tracked by AWS Auto Scaling, which also expands the resource capacity of AWS services automatically. Applications that rely on numerous scalable AWS services use AWS Auto Scaling. It is possible to combine scaling policies for many AWS services. AWS Auto Scaling allows for the combination and inclusion of both Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling and Application Auto Scaling services.

Scaling strategies can be altered to maximize either availability or cost or even both. Scaling policies can monitor performance indicators like CPU usage and add or remove capacity to maintain the indicator's proximity to a target value. Although AWS Auto Scaling is a free service, additional service capacity is charged based on usage.

A must-know for anyone heading into an AWS interview. You should be ready for more AWS basic interview questions like this. 

Organizations may gather, examine, and display Amazon CloudWatch Logs in a single dashboard with the aid of the Centralized Logging on AWS solution. Log files from numerous sources are combined, managed, and analyzed using this system. Amazon CloudWatch Logs from various accounts and AWS Regions can be gathered.

This solution creates a unified view of all the log events using Amazon OpenSearch Service and Kibana, an analytics and visualization platform that is linked with Amazon OpenSearch Service. This solution gives us a ready-to-use environment to start recording and analyzing our AWS infrastructure and apps when combined with other AWS-managed services

With the use of virtualization technologies, servers, storage, networks, and other physical machines can all be created in a virtual environment. To run several virtual machines concurrently on a single physical computer, virtual software imitates the functionality of actual hardware.  

The following are the three key types of virtualizations in AWS: 

  • Hardware Virtual Machine (HVM) 

It is a fully virtualized piece of equipment where each virtual machine functions independently of the others. The root square gadget of your image contains an ace boot record that is executed to start these virtual machines. 

  • Paravirtualization (PV)  

The PV AMIs are initiated by the boot loader Paravirtualization-GRUB. The menu-determined fraction is stacked by the PV-GRUB chain. 

  • HVM Paravirtualization 

Working frameworks can take advantage of system I/O and storage available through the host thanks to PV on HVM. 

A compute instance called a "Network Address Translation (NAT) server" permits communication between private subnets of one network and other networks. With the company's focus on Virtual Private Clouds, the use of NATs has increased on AWS (VPCs).  

AWS expanded its already expansive feature set by including NAT Gateways. An AWS-managed service called a NAT Gateway performs the same functions as a NAT instance. In other words, AWS manages a scalable fleet of NAT instances. Due to its proven ability to scale with traffic requirements, NAT Gateway offers a maintenance-free alternative to NAT instances. Although a NAT Gateway is practical, we must pay the price for it. When using a NAT instance, we are responsible for the EC2 instance's running expenses.

This is a frequently asked AWS Cloud interview question in technical interviews. 

AWS CloudWatch is a centralized monitoring service for both cloud applications and AWS services. It gathers and saves operational data from resources like EC2 instances, RDS databases, VPCs, Lambda functions, and many other services, as well as log files and operational metrics. With the help of AWS CloudWatch, we can keep an eye on our AWS account and its resources, create a stream of events, or set off alarms and commands in response to certain circumstances.

AWS CloudWatch gives us visibility into our AWS resources so we can keep an eye on things like resource usage, app performance, and operational health. These insights might help us manage our application and keep it operating efficiently.

The primary, integrated logging solution for both our apps and Amazon's services is AWS CloudWatch Logs. It offers policies for log data gathering, storage, and retention along with the most fundamental management tools.

Expect to come across this popular AWS interview question.

To provide AWS computing and storage capabilities to their edge locations and transport data to and from AWS, this facility offers safe, reliable, and strong equipment. These items are frequently referred to as AWS Snowball or AWS Snowball Edge devices.

A petabyte-scale data transfer system called a "Snowball device" makes use of dependable appliances to move enormous amounts of data to and from the AWS cloud.

Using Snowball addresses common issues that arise while handling massive data transfers, such as high network costs, protracted transfer times, and security concerns. We must first make an order for Snowball on AWS before we can begin to use it.

We can check, examine, and forecast our expenditure and consumption for free using Cost Explorer. Cost Explorer offers three-month forecasts, historical data, and cost information for the current month. To obtain comprehensive information about our AWS bill in one of your Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) buckets, create an AWS Cost and Usage Report. To see when our reports were most recently updated, simply go back to the Cost & Usage Reports section of our Billing and Cost Management panel.

Plan our service usage, expenses, and instance bookings using AWS Budgets. We can create personalized budgets using AWS Budgets that proactively notify us when our expenses go over our planned spending limit.

I can find resources that are not being utilized to their maximum potential with the aid of AWS Trusted Advisor. Then, to reduce the costs, I can choose to eliminate these unused resources to get email updates on Trusted Advisor checks.

If we are using the default On-demand pricing and have predictable workloads on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), AWS Fargate, or AWS Lambda, we can cut costs by selecting the right Savings Plan.

Reduce the cost of EC2 and Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) instances used in non-production environments by using the AWS Instance Scheduler.

Reduce operational expenses by using Amazon EC2 Spot Instances for stateless, fault-tolerant, or flexible applications, such as workloads that are containerized.

For DDoS protection against all known infrastructure (layer 3 and 4) threats, use AWS Shield, a managed AWS Cloud solution. There are two versions of AWS Shield: AWS Shield Standard and AWS Shield Advanced. The Advanced version offers far greater strength and security than the Standard version.

Free DDoS protection against some of the more prevalent layer 3 (network layer) and layer 4 (transport layer) DDoS attacks is provided by AWS Shield Standard. The Elastic Load Balancers, Amazon CloudFront distributors, and Amazon Route 53 all receive this protection automatically and invisibly.

An extra DDoS mitigation capability, intelligent attack detection, and mitigation against attacks on the application are all features of the subscription service AWS Shield Advanced (AWS WAF included)

The sending of notifications to the subscribers connected to Amazon Web Services Simple Notification Service (AWS SNS) is automated by this web service. This service is offered by SNS for both application-to-application and application-to-person communications. It pushes and delivers messages using the publishers/subscribers paradigm. By distributing the data across several availability zones, data loss is avoided.

It is economical and offers inexpensive infrastructure, particularly for mobile consumers. To an Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS), AWS Lambda functions, or an HTTP endpoint, the notifications are sent via SMS or email. AWS CloudWatch alarm is set off when an instance's CPU usage exceeds 80%. The SNS topic is activated by this CloudWatch alarm, alerting the subscribers to the high CPU usage of the instance.

AWS Solution Architect interview questions like this are a must-know for anyone heading into an AWS interview.

AWS DevOps is Amazon's solution to implementing the DevOps methodology using its cloud platform, specific tools, and services. Their own words are "AWS offers a range of adaptable services that are intended to help businesses use DevOps and AWS to build and deliver products more quickly and reliably.”

These services make it easier to deploy application code, automate software release procedures, provide and manage infrastructure, and track the performance of your application and infrastructure.

AWS DevOps enables teams of application developers to efficiently deploy continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD). This enables us to securely save and version the application source code while automatically creating, testing, and ultimately deploying the application to either on-premises environments or to AWS.

It's no surprise that this and similar AWS basic interview questions pop up in your next interview.

  1. Get Started Quickly: IoT Services on AWS are available in the AWS account and are ready to use without any setup or software to install. 
  2. Fully Managed Services: These services use AWS resources without requiring us to worry about configuring, installing, or running infrastructure manually. 
  3. Built for Scale: Using AWS services, it can scale up to manage thousands of instances in addition to just one. Through straightforward provisioning, configuration, and scaling, these services produce more flexible computing resources. 
  4. Programmable: It gives users the choice of using each service using an API or the AWS CLI. Utilize declarative AWS Cloud creation to model and provision the entire AWS infrastructure. 
  5. Automation: AWS supports us in using automation to build more quickly and effectively. Automate manual procedures or operations like deployment, development, and test workflow using AWS services. 
  6. Secure: Set user permissions and policies using AWS IAM. It is used to control user access to certain AWS resources and how users use those resources. 

A demanding and constantly changing market is catered for by the advancement of the software development lifecycle from scheduled releases to a continuous integration model. AWS launched its CodePipeline product in response to these modifications in 2015. We may automate the release process for our application or service using AWS CodePipeline.

Using the workflow management tool AWS CodePipeline, w can create and control a procedure for building, testing, and deploying our code into either a test or production environment. The pipeline is stopped when issues arise at any step in the procedure, preventing avoidable flaws and failures from being automatically distributed into our environment.

Expect to come across this popular question in AWS interviews. Here is how to define these terms.

AWS CodeBuild

Build and test code with continuous scalability. The completely managed build service AWS CodeBuild compiles source code, performs tests, and creates software packages that are prepared for deployment. We don't have to provision, manage, and scale our own build servers when using CodeBuild. 

AWS CodeDeploy

Coordination of application deployments to Amazon EC2 instances. The service AWS CodeDeploy automates the deployment of code to Amazon EC2 instances. We can deliver new features more quickly, avoid downtime during deployment, and handle the complexity of updating our apps with AWS CodeDeploy. 

AWS CodeBuild is under the "Continuous Integration" tech stack area, whereas AWS CodeDeploy is largely categorized as "Deployment as a Service. 

Below are the steps involved in Codebuild in AWS DevOps: 

  • The First Build 

A few adjustments must be made to create an AWS CodeBuild project. The source code must be linked with the AWS CodeBuild build project in the following step. 

  • Build Environment 

The environment is a straightforward Docker runtime, which we must set up to meet our code-building needs. 

  • The Build Spec 

How to build the program is described in the build spec file. 

  • Artifacts and Build Logs 

With the specifications listed, we can tell AWS CodeBuild to ship logs associated with AWS CloudWatch Logs and upload created artifacts into an S3 bucket. 

  • Time to Build 

We can access more information about the execution by clicking on the build history. We can view the logs and configuration for every build ran. Supplying build-related environment variables.

Private IP addresses, as their name suggests, are IP addresses that aren't reachable via the internet. Private IPs are employed for communicating between instances that are connected to the same network. Only after the instance is terminated will a private IP address that has been assigned to the network interface be released. On the other hand, a public IP address is simple to find online.

One public IP address that is not connected to our AWS account will be assigned automatically to your VPC instance when we activate it. AWS will assign a new public IP address to the instance each time we restart and stop it. The key distinction between an elastic IP and a public IP is persistence. Until we decide to end it, it will be connected to our AWS account. In any case, we can remove elastic IP from one instance and reattach it to another. Elastic IP can be accessed online as well.

This is one of the most frequently asked AWS interview questions for freshers in recent times.

Yes, the number of VPCs, subnets, gateways, and VPNs that I can establish is undoubtedly limited. Per region, 5 VPCs can be created. We have to increase the number of internet gateways by the same number if we want to raise this limit. Also permitted under VPC are 200 subnets.

Per region, 5 elastic IP addresses are permitted. Additionally, there are five Internet, VPN, and NAT gateways per area. Customer gateways are limited to 50 per area, notwithstanding. Per region, 50 VPN connections can be made. These are the limits to the number of VPCs, subnets, gateways, and VPNs that we can create.

Following are some of the alternative tools for logging into the cloud environment: 

  • PuTTY 

On a local Windows PC, we can do this using the free SSH client PuTTY. As soon as the connection is made, we can operate within the EC2 instance just like we would on a local Linux PC. 

  • AWS CLI 

A centralized tool for managing our AWS services is the AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI). 

  • AWS SDK 

The AWS SDK for JavaScript makes it easier to use AWS Services by giving JavaScript developers access to a collection of standard and well-known libraries. Support is given for aspects of the API lifecycle such as credential management, retries, data marshaling, serialization, and deserialization. 

  • Eclipse 

An open-source plug-in for the Eclipse Integrated Development Environment (IDE) called AWS Toolkit for Eclipse makes it simpler for programmers to create, test, and deploy Java applications that use Amazon Web Services. 

When stopped, an instance shuts down normally. Then it executes transactions. The whole EBS volumes are still available, so we can restart the instance whenever we want. The nicest feature is that users are not charged for any time the instance is in the stopped state.

The instance does a standard shutdown after being terminated. The Amazon EBS volumes then begin to be deleted. Simply setting the "Delete on Termination" to false will stop them from deleting. The instance is erased; thus, it cannot be executed once more in the future. This is how terminating and stopping an instance is different in AWS.

Expect to come across this popular AWS basic interview question.

For relational databases, Sharding, commonly referred to as horizontal partitioning, is a common scale-out strategy. A managed relational database service called Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) has excellent capabilities that enable cloud sharding simple to utilize.

Data is divided into smaller subsets using the method known as "Sharding," which is then distributed over several physically independent database servers. A database shard is a term used to describe each server. To produce the same degree of speed, all database shards typically use the same hardware, database engine, and data structure. The main feature that sets sharding apart from other scale-out strategies like database clustering or replication is that they are unaware of one another.

For our EC2 instances, an AWS security group functions as a virtual firewall to manage incoming and outgoing traffic. The flow of traffic to and from our instance is governed by both incoming and outbound rules, respectively.

AWS Security Groups help us secure our cloud environment by limiting the traffic allowed to enter your EC2 servers. Using Security Groups, we can ensure that any communication flowing at the instance level only employs your pre-established ports and protocols. We must add an instance to a specific security group before launching it on Amazon EC2. Each security group can have rules added that permit traffic to or from specified services, including related instances.

Expect to come across this, one of the most popular AWS cloud interview questions.  

Granular access can be granted to several users and groups using AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM). Additionally, it offers Federated Access, which enables us to grant users' applications access to resources without first creating IAM Roles. Several security mechanisms are available from AWS to safeguard data in the cloud.

IAM has become the best choice because of all the factors. As the use of AWS Cloud continues to grow globally, there will be a demand for people who have a thorough understanding of AWS services. IAM will be a significant competitor since online security is so important.

A common AWS basic interview question, don't miss this one. 

Two of the major native AWS logging capabilities are: 

  • AWS CloudTrail 

This support provides a background indicated by the AWS API demands for each record. It enables us to carry out security analysis, asset change monitoring, and regular AWS condition reviews. The best feature of this administration is the ability to configure it to send notifications via AWS SNS whenever new logs are delivered. 

  • AWS Config 

This helps us to understand how our condition's arrangement varies. An AWS stock that includes setup history, arrangement change warnings, and linkages between AWS assets is provided by this service. Additionally, it may be configured to use AWS SNS to broadcast data whenever fresh logs are delivered. 

Stateful firewalls keep a close eye on the communication channels, characteristics, and all aspects of the traffic streams. These firewalls have the ability to incorporate encryption or tunnels and recognize TCP connection stages, packet state, and other crucial status updates. Stateful firewalls are adept at spotting illegal activity or faked communications. Stateful firewalls provide extensive logging features and effective attack defense.

Stateless firewalls keep an eye on all communication channels, traffic streams, and their individual properties. These firewalls have the ability to incorporate encryption or tunnels and recognize TCP connection stages, packet state, and other crucial status updates. Firewalls without states provide quick performance. Stateless firewalls work well under strain without becoming bogged down in the intricacies, and heavy traffic is no match for them.

A staple in AWS interview questions, be prepared to answer this one.  

A Denial of Service (DoS) attack is a malicious attempt to reduce a targeted system's accessibility to authorized end users, such as a website or application. Attackers frequently produce a lot of packets or requests, which eventually overwhelm the target system. In the event of a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, the attacker creates the attack using numerous compromised or controlled sources.

Reducing attackable surface area to limit attacker options and enable the construction of defenses in a single location is one of the first methods to reduce DDoS attacks.

The fully managed NoSQL database service Amazon DynamoDB sometimes referred to as Dynamo Database or DDB, is offered by Amazon Web Services. Scalability and minimal latencies are strengths of DynamoDB. AWS claims that DynamoDB makes it easy and affordable to store any quantity of data, retrieve it, and handle any volume of request traffic.

Solid-state drives, which offer excellent I/O performance and are better able to manage large-scale demands, are used to store all data objects. The AWS Management Console or a DynamoDB API are the two ways an AWS user can communicate with the service.

Documents, graphs, and columnar data models are among the non-relational, NoSQL database model options that DynamoDB supports.

AWS cloud interview questions like this are a must-know for anyone heading into a cloud developer interview.

One of the Amazon Web Services, Amazon Database, provides managed databases, managed services, and NoSQL. Additionally, it offers in-memory caching as a service and a fully managed petabyte-scale data warehouse solution.

Users can use the Amazon relational database service to operate, set up, and scale an online database within the cloud, among other services. It automates administrative operations like data configuration, hardware provisioning, backups, and maintenance. Users may resize and save money with the help of an Amazon relational database. It saves time by automating tasks, allowing the user to focus on the applications, and giving them high availability, quick performance, compatibility, and security.

This is a common AWS interview question, so don't miss this one.

One of the most frequently posed S3 interview questions, be ready for it.  

An online petabyte-scale data warehousing service is called Amazon Redshift. We can scale from a few hundred gigabytes of data to a petabyte or more by starting small. This enables us to leverage your data to discover new information about our clients and organization.

An Amazon Redshift cluster of nodes must first be launched in order to establish a data warehouse. We can upload our data set and run data analysis queries after provisioning our cluster. No matter how big the data set, Amazon Redshift offers quick query performance utilizing the same SQL-based tools and BI programs we now use.

Redis and Memcached are two key-value engines that can be supported by Amazon ElastiCache, an in-memory key-value store. It is completely managed by Amazon and has no administration. We can either create a brand-new, high-performance application or enhance an existing one with the aid of Amazon ElastiCache. ElastiCache has a number of applications in the gaming and healthcare industries, among others.

By caching information that is frequently accessed, web applications' efficiency may be enhanced. Using in-memory caching, the information may be accessed relatively quickly. There is no need to oversee a separate caching server while using ElastiCache. An in-memory data source with high throughput and low latency is simple to establish or operate.

Types of Engines in ElastiCache are: 

  • Memcached 

The high-performance cache is a well-liked in-memory data storage that programmers utilize to accelerate programs. Memcached can retrieve the data in less than a millisecond by keeping the data in memory rather than on a disc. It functions by preserving every key value for all other data to be stored, uniquely identifying each data, and enabling Memcached to locate the record quickly. 

  • Redis 

For real-time processing, today's applications require low latency and high throughput performance. Redis is the most chosen among developers due to its performance, simplicity, and capability. It offers low latency and great performance for real-time applications. Strings, hashes, and other complicated datatypes are supported, and backup and restore functions are included. Redis supports up to 512 MB, however, Memcached only allows key names and values up to 1 MB. 

Intermediate

A staple in AWS basic interview questions, be prepared to answer this one.

  1. Globally Dispersed Servers: Because Amazon is a global service, it has DNS servers all over the world. Any consumer submitting a query from anywhere in the world will be connected to a low-latency DNS server that is close by. 
  2. Dependability: Route 53 offers the high degree of dependability that essential applications demand. 
  3. Optimal Locations: Route 53 fulfills requests from clients at the closest data center to them. Global data centers are available through AWS. The data can be cached in a number of data centers spread out throughout the world, depending on the requirements and configuration chosen. Any server in any data center that has the necessary information can react, thanks to Route 53. 

To have nearly no impact on any workloads running on key systems, near-zero downtime refers to establishing the shortest tolerable duration (or periods) of business disruption. 

With nearly no downtime, a system can be updated or downgraded using the migration techniques described below: 

  • Dispatch EC2 Console. 
  • Opt for AMI Operating System. 
  • The instance type should be opened in a new instance. 
  • Complete all the updates. 
  • Installing Programs. 
  • Verify the instance's functionality by checking it. 
  • Launch the new instance and shut down the old one if it is successful. 

We can upgrade or downgrade the system once it has been implemented with no downtime in AWS. 

IAM allows us to create permissions based on policy templates provided by AWS, such as "Administrator Access," which grants full access to all AWS resources and services, "Power User Access," which grants full access to all AWS resources and services but disallows access to managing users and groups, and even "Read Only Access." Users and groups are subject to these policies. We can grant access to other users for the AWS Resources as well as add, delete, change, or inspect the resources.

Administrator access is provided with Power User access but without the ability to control users and permissions. In other words, a user who has Power User Access can create, delete, change, or view the resources but cannot allow other users access.

One of the most frequently posed AWS interview questions, be ready for it.

Businesses can display customized content to their audience based on their geographic location using the geo-targeting idea without modifying the URL. This makes it easier for us to generate content that is specifically tailored to the demands of a local audience.

We can identify the nation from which end users are requesting our content using Amazon CloudFront.

Our Origin server can receive this data from Amazon CloudFront and send it there. A fresh HTTP header is used to send it. We can provide distinct content for various versions of the same content based on various countries. At various Edge Locations that are nearer to the end customers in that nation, these versions can be cached.

A DRP (Disaster Recovery Plan) is an organized and specific plan of action intended to aid systems and networks in recovering from failures or attacks. The fundamental goal is to assist an organization in returning to a functioning state as soon as possible. AWS on-premises disaster recovery solutions are often expensive to deploy and maintain.

As a result, the majority of businesses use disaster recovery technologies and services that cloud vendors offer. Establishing procedures and disaster recovery plans is essential for a smoothly running company. When these are in place, a business can minimize service interruptions in the case of a crisis. As a result, less damage is done overall.

Disaster Recovery is a regular feature in AWS interviews, be ready to tackle questions on this topic.

AWS services that are not region-specific are: 

  • AWS IAM: 

We may securely manage access to AWS resources with the aid of the web service known as AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM). IAM enables u to centrally manage the permissions that regulate who can access which AWS resources. IAM allows us to manage who has access to resources and who is authenticated (signed in) and authorized (has permissions). 

  • AWS Route 53: 

A Domain Name System (DNS) web service with high availability and scalability is Amazon Route 53. User queries are routed through Route 53 to internet applications that are running on AWS or locally. 

  • AWS CloudFront: 

A content delivery network (CDN) service called Amazon CloudFront is designed for excellent performance, security, and developer convenience. 

Data will eventually be consistent, but it could not happen right away, according to the concept of eventual consistency. The client requests will be fulfilled more quickly as a result, although some of the first read requests might end up reading stale material. It is preferable to have this kind of consistency in systems when real-time data is not required. For instance, it is acceptable if we don't immediately see the most current tweets on Twitter or updates on Facebook. 

Strong Consistency- It offers instant consistency, ensuring that the data is the same across all DB Servers. Accordingly. It can take some time for this model to make the data consistent and then resume serving requests. However, this architecture ensures that all responses will always contain data that is consistent.

We must establish an RTO and RPO for each application based on effect analysis and risk assessment as part of disaster recovery planning. RTO is the longest period of time that can be tolerated between the interruption of a service and its resumption. This goal establishes the permissible window of time during which an application may be unavailable.

The maximum allowable time lag between the most recent data saved in the application and the data in the disaster recovery site is known as RPO. This goal establishes the maximum amount of time that a disaster-related interruption or data loss is deemed tolerable.

An AWS-managed solution for web applications is called Elastic Beanstalk. A pre-configured EC2 server called Elastic Beanstalk can directly accept our application code and environment configurations and utilize them to automatically provision and deploy the resources needed in AWS to operate the web application.

Elastic Beanstalk is a Platform as A Service (PAAS), as opposed to EC-2, which is Infrastructure as a Service because it enables users to directly use a pre-configured server for their application. Of course, we may deploy apps without ever using elastic beanstalk, but doing so would require that we select the best service from among the wide range of AWS services, manually provision these AWS resources, and then piece the resources together to create a whole web application.

Based on our learner survey, this is also one of the most frequently asked AWS interview questions.

AWS's Elastic Transcoder service is used to transcode media files from an S3 bucket into formats that can be played on a variety of devices. A media transcoder on the cloud is called Elastic Transcoder. It is used to change media files from their source format into a variety of formats that may be played on computers, tablets, smartphones, and other devices.

Since it offers to transcode pre-sets for various output formats, we may choose the parameters that are most effective for a certain device without having to make any educated guesses. If we utilize Elastic Transcoder, we must pay based on the amount of time and resolution we spend transcoding.

EC2 server is a computer with the operating system and hardware of our choice. But the fact that it is entirely virtualized makes a difference. On a single piece of physical hardware, we can run numerous virtual computers. A vital component of the AWS ecosystem is Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2). In the AWS cloud, EC2 makes scalable, on-demand computing capacity possible.

There is no need to maintain any rented hardware because Amazon EC2 instances erase the upfront hardware expenditure. We can create and launch applications more quickly thanks to it. As many virtual servers as we require can be launched using EC2 on the AWS platform. Additionally, we can scale up or down in response to changes in website traffic.

A must-know for anyone heading into an AWS interview, this question is frequently asked in AWS interviews.

The following are some features of EC2: 

  1. Our applications can have direct access to the processor and memory of the underlying server with Amazon EC2 bare metal instances. 
  2. While our instance is in hibernation, there will be no instance usage fees. Standard EBS rates apply to storage fees. 
  3. For customers running extremely high-performance NoSQL databases, transactional systems, and Elastic Search workloads, High I/O I3 and I3en instances with NVMe-based SSDs are the best options. 
  4. For usage with Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon EBS offers persistent, highly available, consistent, low-latency block storage volumes. 
  5. For use in dynamic cloud computing, elastic IP addresses are static IP addresses. 
  6. In contrast to conventional implementations, this functionality leverages a new network virtualization stack that offers better I/O performance and lower CPU consumption. 

On-Demand Instances, Reserved Instances, Spot Instances, and Dedicated Hosts are the four pricing tiers for Amazon EC2 instances. 

  • On-demand Instances 

In this arrangement, depending on the instances we select, there are no upfront costs, and we only pay for computing capacity per hour or per second (only for Linux Instances). 

  • Spot Instances 

Unused EC2 instances are known as Amazon EC2 Spot Instances in the AWS cloud. Spot Instances can be purchased for up to 90% less than on-demand rates. 

  • Reserved Instances 

We can save up to 75% on Amazon EC2 Reserved Instances when compared to the cost of On-Demand Instances.  

  • Dedicated Hosts 

A physical EC2 server designated for our usage is a dedicated host. 

The types of instances in EC2 are: 

  • Memory-Optimized Instances 

Instances that are optimized for memory are designed for workloads that need the processing of large datasets in memory. 

  • Compute-Optimized Instances 

Applications that need a lot of computation and assistance from powerful CPUs should use compute-optimized instances. Like general-purpose instances, we can use compute-optimized instances for workloads like web, application, and gaming servers. 

  • General-Purpose Instances 

In general-purpose instances, the distribution of memory, processing power, and networking resources are balanced. 

  • Storage Optimized Instances 

Workloads that require quick, sequential read and write access to enormous datasets are catered for by storage-optimized instances. 

  • Accelerated Computing Instances 

In instances of accelerated computing, coprocessors are employed to do operations faster than CPU-based software. Examples of these functions include data pattern matching, graphics processing, and floating-point numerical computations. 

The root device volume houses the image that is used to boot an instance when we launch it. The root device for an instance launched from an AMI is an instance store volume produced from a template stored in Amazon S3 since, when we first released Amazon EC2, all AMIs were backed by the service. AMIs that are supported by Amazon EBS was introduced after we announced Amazon EBS.

This indicates that an Amazon EBS volume made from an Amazon EBS snapshot serves as the root device for an instance launched from the AMI. AMIs backed by Amazon EC2 instance store and AMIs backed by Amazon EBS are also options.

Scalable, quick, and web-based cloud storage is available through Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3). The service is made to archive and backup data and applications online for use with Amazon Web Services (AWS). The purpose of Amazon S3, which has a limited feature set, is to simplify web-scale computing for developers.

For items saved in the service, S3 offers 99.999999999% durability and supports a number of security and compliance certifications. S3 can be connected to other AWS security and monitoring services like CloudTrail, CloudWatch, and Macie by an administrator. There is a sizable network of business partners that connects their products directly to S3. Access to S3 application programming interfaces enables data transfer to S3 over the open internet (APIs).

A public cloud storage resource in Amazon Web Services' (AWS) Simple Storage Service (S3), an object storage service, is called an Amazon S3 bucket. The objects that are stored in Amazon S3 buckets, which resemble file folders, are made up of data and the metadata that describes it.

An S3 customer first establishes a bucket and gives it a globally distinctive name in the desired AWS region. To cut expenses and latency, AWS advises customers to select regions that are close to their location.

After creating the bucket, the user selects an S3 tier for the data, where each tier has a different level of redundancy, cost, and accessibility. Objects from several S3 storage tiers can be stored in the same bucket.

The following are the benefits of AWS S3: 

  1. Durability- S3 offers a durability of 99.999999999 percent. 
  2. Low Cost- A variety of "storage classes" are available with S3. These classes are determined by the frequency and promptness of your file access needs. 
  3. Scalability- There are no overage or hidden costs with S3, and we only pay for the resources we really utilize. To effortlessly meet the shifting needs of our organization, we may scale our storage resources. 
  4. Availability- S3 provides 99.99 % object availability. 
  5. Security- S3 delivers an incredible selection of encryption capabilities and access management solutions that guarantee top-notch security. 
  6. Flexibility- Data storage, data backup, software distribution, data archiving, disaster recovery, website hosting, mobile applications, Internet of Things devices, and many other uses are all excellent candidates for S3. 
  7. Simple Data Transfer- Executing data transfers on S3 doesn't need being a computer expert. The focus of the service is on use and simplicity. 

The types of storage classes in S3 are as follows: 

  • Amazon S3 Standard 

It provides high object storage performance, availability, and durability for frequently requested data and is used for general purposes. S3 Standard is suitable for a wide range of use cases, including big data analytics, mobile and gaming apps, dynamic websites, content distribution, cloud applications, and dynamic websites. In order to ensure durability, availability, and performance to a greater level, it is primarily utilized for general applications. 

  • Amazon S3 Standard-Infrequent Access 

Users use S3 Standard-IA to access the less-used data. When needed, it needs to be accessed quickly. Using S3 Standard-IA, we can obtain high strength, high output, and low bandwidth. The backup and recovery of data should be kept for a long time. It serves as a repository for data used in disaster recovery. 

  • Amazon S3 One Zone-Infrequent Access 

S3 One Zone-IA, which costs 20% less than S3 Standard-IA, stores data in a single Availability Zone as opposed to other S3 Storage Classes, which must store data in at least three Availability Zones. It is a great option for keeping extra backup copies of on-premises data or data that can be simply recreated. We can get the same high reliability, high throughput, and low latency with S3 One Zone-IA as with S3 Standard. 

  • Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering 

The user's cost of storage is automatically reduced by the initial cloud storage. Based on frequency, it offers very affordable access without interfering with other performances. It also oversees challenging operations. Granular objects automatically see cost reductions thanks to Amazon S3 Intelligent - Tiering. Amazon S3 Intelligent - Tiering has no retrieval fees. 

  • Amazon S3 Glacier Instant Retrieval 

It is an archive storage class that offers the most affordable data archiving storage and is structured to give us the best performance and flexibility. Access to archive storage is provided with the quickest speed via S3 Glacier Instant Retrieval. Data retrieval in milliseconds is the same as in the S3 standard. 

  • Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive 

The Glacier Deep Archive storage class is made to offer huge data sets long-term, safe storage at a cost that is competitive with very low-cost off-premises tape preservation services. 

Replicating objects between buckets using Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3) Replication is a flexible, fully managed, and affordable service. Objects can be automatically and asynchronously copied between Amazon S3 buckets thanks to replication. The same AWS account or distinct AWS accounts may possess buckets that are set up for object replication. We can copy objects within the same AWS Region or between other AWS Regions. The status of object replication between buckets may now be tracked with the use of precise metrics and notifications provided by Amazon S3 Replication.

By tracking bytes pending, operations pending, and replication delay between our source and destination buckets, CloudWatch allows us to keep an eye on the replication status. We can quickly identify and fix configuration issues by using S3 Event Notifications to readily receive replication failure notifications.

A virtual private cloud (VPC) is a private cloud that is safe and independent and is hosted inside a public cloud. The private cloud is hosted remotely by a public cloud provider, but VPC customers can still perform all the duties of a conventional private cloud, such as running code, storing data, hosting websites, and so forth (Not all private clouds are hosted in this manner).

VPCs combine the scalability and usability of public cloud computing with the data isolation of private cloud computing. Businesses that want a private cloud environment but also want to take advantage of public cloud resources and savings stand to gain the most from VPCs.

This is a common AWS S3 interview question, so don't miss this one.

One of the most frequently posed AWS interview questions, be ready for it.  

Amazon VPC components are: 

  1. Subnet: In a VPC, a subnet is a collection of IP addresses. It is a portion of a VPC that shares an address component and can contain resources like Amazon EC2 services. 
  2. Route Table: They comprise the collection of guidelines used to determine how network traffic should be controlled. 
  3. Virtual Private Gateway: To have a safe transaction, you must use the VPN (Virtual Private Network) hub on the Amazon side of the VPN connection. 
  4. NAT Gateway: The Network Address Translation (NAT) Gateway modifies the private subnet's routing table to direct traffic there. 
  5. VPC Peering: We can use an IPv4 or IPv6-based VPC peering connection to route traffic between two Virtual Private Clouds. 
  6. Security Groups: The traffic for our sample is governed by a set of firewall rules. 
  7. Elastic IP: A static IP address is a reserved public IP address that can be given to any instance in a certain region and never changes. 
  8. Network Access Control Lists (NACL): It serves as a firewall to regulate traffic entering and leaving one or more subnets and is an optional layer of protection for your VPC. 
  9. Customer Gateway: A presenter on our end of the connection is a customer gateway. A hardware or software appliance may be used. 
  10. Network Interface: It is a link between public and private networks. 
  11. VPC Endpoints: Without accessing the internet, it enables VPC to connect to other AWS services. 
  12. IP Addressing: We can assign our IPv4 and IPv6 subnets to our virtual private networks (VPCs) using IP addresses. 

Managing the traffic, for instance, is a security group's job in a VPC. A single instance may exist in many different places. Actually, it serves as a fictitious firewall that can manage inbound and outbound traffic for several EC2 instances. The traffic within each security group's related instances can be managed by manually adding rules to the group.

Security groups can be found in the VPC and EC2 parts of the AWS UI. All security groups permit outgoing traffic by default. We can set rules to enable inbound traffic in a similar manner. However, we are only permitted to set up "allow" rules, not denial rules, to limit security rights. Additionally, regardless of the time, a security group's rules can be changed, and the change will take effect immediately.

This is a common AWS interview question, so don't miss this one.

Similar to how a network security group in a VPC controls inbound and outbound traffic, network ACLs perform the same role. The primary distinction between a security group and a network ACL is that the latter's function is to serve as a firewall for related EC2 instances, whilst the former is to serve as a firewall for related subnets. 

An ACL is automatically generated by your VPC by default, and it can be changed. This default network ACL, unlike a security group, permits all incoming and outgoing traffic by default. Additionally, a single ACL may be linked to numerous subnets. However, a network ACL can only ever be connected to one subnet at a time.

A method for safely tying up two or more virtual private clouds, or VPCs, is called VPC peering. A networking link between two VPCs that enables us to transmit traffic between them using private IPv4 addresses or IPv6 addresses" is what a VPC peering connection is," according to Amazon. Instances in either VPC can communicate with one another after being joined by a VPC peering connection in the same way as if they were on the same network.

VPC peering provides significant security and performance advantages in contemporary network designs with numerous clouds. However, in order to prevent potential problems with network performance, it's crucial to make sure that we correctly monitor and manage VPC peering arrangements.

A staple in AWS basic interview questions, be prepared to answer this one.  

An AWS service called AWS CloudFormation automates the creation of AWS resources by using template files. Because it can automate the setup and deployment of different Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) products on AWS, it can also be referred to as an infrastructure automation tool, an Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) tool, or a cloud automation solution. Almost all AWS services are supported by CloudFormation.

The configuration of workloads that run on the most common AWS services, such as the EC2 compute service, the S3 storage service, and the IAM service for defining access control, can be automated using CloudFormation. Additionally, AWS services that focus on specialized use cases, such as Ground Station, the AWS satellite management service, can benefit from the use of CloudFormation templates.

The following are features of AWS CloudFormation: 

  • Extensibility 

We can model and provision third-party resources and modules released by AWS Partner Network (APN) Partners and the developer community using the AWS CloudFormation Registry. 

  • Cross-account Management 

With just one CloudFormation template, we can supply a common set of AWS resources across several accounts and regions. No matter where the stacks are, StackSets takes care of automatically and safely provisioning, updating, or deleting them. 

  • Cross-use of Familiar Programming Languages 

We can define our cloud environment using TypeScript, Python, Java, and .NET with the help of the AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK). 

  • Preview Changes to Your Environment 

We can preview how proposed changes to a stack would affect our currently running resources using AWS CloudFormation Change Sets, for instance, to see whether our changes will delete or replace any crucial resources. 

  • Managing Your Dependency 

During stack management activities, AWS CloudFormation automatically maintains resource dependencies between our resources. 

Using a Text File or Programming Language, CloudFormation lets us model our entire infrastructure and application resources. The CloudFormation CLI and Registry make it simple to manage resources from third parties. With the support of CloudFormation, we can standardize the infrastructure components used throughout the company, enabling configuration compliance and accelerating troubleshooting.

CloudFormation automates the provisioning of our application resources in a repeatable, safe manner, enabling us to create and rebuild our infrastructure and applications without the need for manual labor or the use of specialized scripts. The management of selecting the appropriate operations to carry out when managing our stack, orchestrating them most effectively, and immediately undoing changes if problems are found is handled by CloudFormation.

The steps involved in CloudFormation are: 

  • Choose a Template 

We must first create a template that lists the resources we wish to include in our stack. We utilize a supplied sample template for this phase. 

  • Ascertain That you Have all the Materials for the Stack Ready 

Prior to building a stack using a template, confirm that all necessary dependent resources are available. Both resources declared in the template itself and resources already present in AWS can be used or referenced by a template. 

  • Create the Stack 

Our stack will be built using the WordPress-1.0.0 file that was previously mentioned. Several AWS resources, including an EC2 instance, are included in the template. 

  • Track the Development of the Stack 

The resources indicated in the template are started being created by CloudFormation once we have finished the Create Stack dialogue. The CloudFormation console's list at the top includes our new stack, MyWPTestStack. It should have the status CREATE IN PROGRESS. By viewing its events, we can examine a stack's detailed state. 

  • Use your Stack Resources 

When CloudFormation has completed generating the stack MyWPTestStack and its state is CREATE COMPLETE, we can begin accessing the stack's resources. 

  • Tidy Up 

The CloudFormation getting started tasks have been finished by us. We can clean up by eliminating the stack and its resources to make sure we aren't charged for any unnecessary services. 

A Stack is a grouping of AWS resources that may be managed as a single entity. The template for CloudFormation defines a stack where resources may be reliably added, removed, or changed. All of the hardware (web server, database, etc) needed to run a web application may be present in a stack. A hierarchy of stacks is created by nested stacks. We are able to build stacked stacks by using the CloudFormation stack resource.

With a Windows stack, we can customize and update our stack in Windows instances. We can build Microsoft Windows stacks for the Windows AMI on Amazon EC2 using AWS CloudFormation.

Amazon's block-level storage solution, called AWS Elastic Block Store (EBS), is used with the EC2 cloud service to store persistent data. This means that even when the EC2 instances are shut down, the data is retained on the AWS EBS servers. Users can grow storage capacity at a low subscription-based cost since EBS offers the same high availability and low latency characteristics inside the chosen availability zone.

Similar to a traditional block storage drive, the data volumes can be dynamically attached, detached, and scaled with any EC2 instance. The EBS solution, a very reliable cloud service, promises a 99.999% uptime. The normal EC2 Instance Store, which just makes temporary storage on the physical EC2 host servers available, is different from AWS EBS.

It's no surprise that this one pops up often in AWS Cloud interviews.  

One of the most frequently posed S3 interview questions, be ready for it.  

The five different EBS volume types are as follows: 

  1. General Purpose SSD (gp2): The root volume of our instance by default on EC2 is the SSD (Solid State Drive). For simple input/output activities, SSDs outperform HDDs by a wide margin (Hard Disk Drive). Its price-to-performance ratio is favorable (measured in IOPS - Input-Output Operations per second).
  2. SSD with Provisioned IOPS (io1): The most expensive and time-consuming EBS volume. They are made for applications like sizable Relational or NoSQL databases that demand a lot of I/O.
  3. Throughput-Optimized HDDs (st1): These low-cost magnetic storage volumes, whose performance is gauged in terms of throughput, are known as throughput-optimized HDDs (st1).
  4. Cold HDDs (sc1): Even less expensive than throughput-optimized magnetic storage are cold HDDs (sc1). They are made to handle heavy, sequential cold workloads, such as those on a file server.
  5. Magnetic (standard): Workloads with occasional data access are best suited for these older-generation magnetic discs.

The following are the benefits of AWS EBS: 

  1. Speed and Agile- Traditional on-premises installations involve a drawn-out procurement process that necessitates significant upfront capital expenditure and several clearances. 
  2. Cost Efficient- When not in use, turn off non-production environments to reduce costs. 
  3. Flexible- We can quickly build as many new environments as we require with AWS. Our instances can be scaled up or down at any moment, and we only pay for the capacity we really use. 
  4. Test Application Performance- On the AWS Cloud, a performance test environment may be rapidly and easily generated for the exact length of the performance-test cycle and only used as needed. By only paying for the capacity, we utilize while using it, we can save money once more. 

An EC2 instance that uses an EBS volume as its root device is known as an "EBS-backed" instance. A single EC2 instance can have up to 27 EBS volumes attached to it. Additionally, for a few instances kinds, this count varies.  For optimal performance, restrict the number of EBS maximum volumes attached to EC2 instances. Plan our instance capacity as well according to the workload we intend to run.

For instance, databases need a lot of IOPS to support high read-write rates. The size of the disc affects IOPS. The IOPS increases as the size increases. It is advised to create EBS volume snapshots for high data availability and recovery choices.

Any EC2 instance located in the same Availability Zone can have an Amazon EBS volume attached to it. We can only attach a created encrypted EBS volume to specified instance types. 

Techniques for creating an EBS volume: 

  1. When you launch instances, you can create and attach EBS volumes by specifying a block device mapping. See Block device mappings and launch an instance using the new launch instance wizard for more details. 
  2. Attach a newly created EBS volume to an active instance. Creating an empty volume is where we can find out more information. 
  3. From a previously made snapshot, we will build an EBS volume and attach it to an active instance. 
  4. Create a volume from a snapshot below for further details. 

Advanced

By purchasing the unused EC2 instance's hourly compute power through a Spot instance, you can save money. The price we will pay is the "Spot Price." Spot instances are helpful for running non-critical workloads that can be interrupted without causing a problem (AWS refers to these workloads as "fault-tolerant").

These VPC instances—virtual private clouds are restricted for use by a single client. Since they are isolated at the host level, each customer would have exclusive use of all instances running on the host.

But if we want even greater isolation and command over our infrastructure, we have another choice. When opposed to on-demand pricing, Amazon EC2 Reserved Instances (RI) offer a large discount (up to 72%) and a capacity reservation when in specific AZ.

Popular AWS interview questions and answers for experienced professionals like these are fairly common.

Elastic Compute Cloud is known as EC2. On the AWS cloud platform, EC2 is a service for on-demand computing. All the services a computing device can provide us with as well as the adaptability of a virtual environment are together referred to as computing. Additionally, it enables users to customize their instances in accordance with their needs, which includes allocating RAM, ROM, and storage space in accordance with the demands of the current work.

We now have the option to switch from the existing "instance count-based limitations" to the new "vCPU Based constraints" in order to make limit administration simpler. As a result, utilization is calculated using the number of vCPUs when launching a variety of instance types dependent on demand.

We can manage ongoing requests on servers that are being updated or shut down thanks to AWS's Connection Draining capability. By turning on Connection Draining, we enable the Load Balancer to delay sending new requests to an outgoing instance for a certain period of time in order to force it to finish processing its current requests. All outstanding requests will be failed if Connection Draining is not enabled, and an instance will stop right away.

While removing an instance out of operation, updating its software, or replacing it with a new instance that has updated software, AWS ELB connection draining prevents breaking open network connections.

In Amazon LightSail, we may create point-in-time snapshots of instances, databases, and block storage drives and utilize them as starting points for the creation of new resources or as data backups. All the information required to restore our resources is in a snapshot (from the moment when the snapshot was taken). The rebuilt resource starts out as an identical clone of the original resource that was used to construct the snapshot when we restore a resource by building it from a snapshot.

Regardless of whether they are manual, automatic, duplicated, or system disc snapshots, all snapshots on our LightSail account will incur a storage fee. We never know when our resources will fail, therefore create snapshots periodically to prevent losing our data forever.

A must-know for anyone heading into a cloud interview, this question is one of the most frequently asked AWS interview questions.

An on-premises, hybrid, and AWS application or resource can be monitored and managed with Amazon CloudWatch, which offers data and useful insights. Instead of keeping track of them separately, we can gather and access all of the operational and performance data from a single platform in the form of logs and metrics (server, network, or database).  

Our entire stack (applications, infrastructure, network, and services) can be monitored with CloudWatch, and we can leverage alarms, logs, and events data to automate actions and speed up mean time to resolution (MTTR). This helps us to concentrate on creating applications and commercial value while freeing up crucial resources. It aids in keeping track of: 

  1. Amazon EC2 Auto-scaling lifecycle events state changes 
  2. Planned events 
  3. AWS API requests 
  4. Events for console sign-in 

In AWS, a policy is an object that, when linked to an entity or resource, determines the rights of that resource or entity. The following guidelines can be established for user passwords:

  1.  A minimum password length can be specified.
  2.  We can request that users make their passwords at least one number or another unique character.
  3.  Determining the specifications for certain character kinds, such as uppercase, lowercase, numerals, and non-alphanumeric characters.
  4.  The next time while checking in to AWS, we can request a password reset, enforce automatic password expiration, and restrict the reuse of previous credentials.
  5.  When the user has permitted the password to expire, we can instruct AWS users to get in touch with an account administrator.  

A common AWS interview question for experienced professionals, don't miss this one.

A staple in AWS interview questions, be prepared to answer this one.  

Amazon Relational Database Service uses Amazon Elastic Block Store to provide raw block-level storage that may be linked to Amazon EC2 instances. It is one of the two alternatives for block storage that AWS provides; the other is EC2 Instance Store.

Data on EBS cannot be accessed directly with an AWS graphical interface. The EBS volume is given to an EC2 instance as part of this procedure. We can write to or read from this disc when it is attached to either a Windows or a Unix instance. First, we can create unique volumes using screenshots taken from the data-containing volumes. Each EBS volume in this instance can only be connected to one instance.

AWS CloudTrail keeps track of user API activity and gives access to the data. We may obtain complete information about API operations using CloudTrail, including the caller's identity, the time of the call, the request parameters, and the contents of the response. On the other side, AWS Config stores configuration items that represent point-in-time configuration information for our AWS resources (CIs).

A CI can be used to determine the state of AWS resources at any given time. In contrast, we may rapidly determine who called an API to alter a resource by utilizing CloudTrail. If a security group was configured improperly, we can find out via Cloud Trail.

An instance is derived from an AMI, which acts as a kind of blueprint for virtual machines. When launching an instance, AWS provides pre-baked AMIs that you can select from. Some of these AMIs are not free; instead, they must be purchased through the AWS Marketplace.

To conserve space on AWS, we can also decide to design our own unique AMI. We can modify AMI to do that, for instance, if we don't require a particular collection of software on the installation. This reduces costs because we are getting rid of unnecessary items. This is how I believe AMI fits into the design of an AWS system.

If a backup AWS Direct connect has been set up, it will switch to the backup in the event of a failure. To ensure quicker detection and failover, it is advised to set Bidirectional Forwarding Detection (BFD) while configuring your connections. In contrast, if we have set up a backup IPsec VPN connection, all VPC traffic will automatically failover to that connection.

Traffic will be sent/received over the Internet to/from open resources like Amazon S3. In the event of a failure, Amazon VPC traffic will be lost if we don't have a backup AWS Direct Connect link or an IPsec VPN link.

One of the most frequently posed AWS interview questions, be ready for it.  

When an EC2 instance's CPU use exceeds 80%, it can be done by setting up an autoscaling group to deploy more instances. Additionally, traffic can be distributed among instances by creating an application load balancer and designating specific EC2 instances as target instances.

All of the scalable resources that enable a user's application are automatically discovered by AWS Auto Scaling, which also monitors their performance. These resources can be spread over several cloud services. Additionally, it allows us to view resource usage for many services through a single user interface.

The cloud provider's Auto Scaling solution, which can only scale individual services, is different from AWS Auto Scaling. Step scaling policies and scheduled scaling, neither of which are supported by AWS Auto Scaling, are made possible by this utility, which comes with two separate APIs.

One of the key factors in businesses shifting to the cloud has been the capacity to scale up in response to client demand and scale back once that need has been met. With the help of AWS autoscaling, anyone may maintain application performance in a single unified interface and do so at the most affordable cost. AWS Auto Scaling is a service that aids users in monitoring applications and automatically modifies capacity to provide constant, predictable performance at the least expensive rate.

Using AWS Auto Scaling groups, a multi-availability zone application load balancer can be built. Mount a target on each instance, then save data in Amazon EFS. The Amazon Elastic File System is a serverless, set-and-forget elastic file system (Amazon EFS).

Amazon Simple Email Service (Amazon SES), a cloud-based email-sending service, can be used to achieve this. Pay-per-use service Amazon Simple Email Service enables us to integrate email functionality into an AWS-based application. This solution delivers a high rate of email deliverability and quick, simple access to our email-sending statistics using SMTP or a straightforward API call. 

Additionally, it offers built-in alerts for both successful and failure email delivery as well as complaints. Email or the Amazon Simple Notification Service can be used by Amazon SES to send bounce-back and complaint messages.

Up to 5 terabytes of objects or data can be stored using Amazon S3. We must use the Multipart upload tool from AWS to upload a file larger than 100 megabytes. We can upload a huge file in numerous sections by using multipart upload.

There will be separate uploads for every component. It is not important which order the parts are uploaded in. To save overall time, it even permits uploading various components simultaneously. When all the components are uploaded, this tool unifies them into one object or file that served as the foundation for the components.

This is a frequently asked AWS Solution Architect interview question as well.

We will make an AMI of the server that is currently active in the US Ohio region. The administrator will want 12-digit account number of AWS account once AMI has been produced. This is necessary in order to duplicate the AMI that we have developed.

We can launch the instance using the cloned AMI in the Mumbai region when the AMI has been successfully copied into that area. The server in the Ohio (US) region might be shut down once the instance has started and is fully functional. The easiest way to move a server to a new account is to do it in this manner.

We would use instances with EBS Volume or instances backed by EBS. EBS volume serves as the root volume for EBS-backed instances. Operating Systems, applications, and data are all contained in these volumes. From these volumes, we can produce snapshots or an AMI. EBS Snapshots are a point-in-time replica of your data that can be used to facilitate data migration between regions and accounts, enable disaster recovery, and enhance backup compliance.

Through AWS Management Console, AWS Command Line Interface (CLI), or the AWS SDKs, we may generate and manage our EBS Snapshots. The primary benefit of an EBS-backed volume is the ability to configure the data to be kept for later retrieval even if the virtual machine or instances are terminated.

Expect to come across this popular question in AWS interviews.

Every availability zone can have an in-memory cache powered by ElastiCache deployed. In each availability zone, this will facilitate the creation of a cached version of the website for speedier access. Amazon ElastiCache is an in-memory caching service that is completely controlled and supports a variety of real-time use cases. ElastiCache can be used as a primary data store for use cases including session stores, gaming leader boards, streaming, and analytics, or for caching, which improves application and database performance.

Redis and Memcached are compatible with ElastiCache. Additionally, we can create an RDS MySQL read replica for each availability zone, which will aid in more effective read operations. Therefore, RDS MySQL instance won't experience an increase in workload, which will resolve the contention issue.

The two types of scaling are vertical scaling and horizontal scaling. Our master database can be vertically scaled up with the click of a button thanks to vertical scaling. The RDS can be resized in 18 different ways, however, databases can only be scaled vertically. Horizontal scaling, on the other hand, is advantageous for copies. These can only be carried out using Amazon Aurora because they are read-only replicas.

A relational database engine called Amazon Aurora combines the ease of use and low cost of an open-source database with the strength, speed, and dependability of a top-tier commercial database. Performance with Aurora is three times better than PostgreSQL and five times greater than a conventional MySQL database.

An example of this kind of design is a hybrid cloud. Why? because we utilize both the on-site servers, or private cloud, and the public cloud. Wouldn't it be better if our private and public clouds were all on the same network to make this hybrid architecture easier to use? (virtually). 

This is done by putting the public cloud servers in a virtual private cloud and utilizing a VPN to connect it to the on-premises systems (Virtual Private Network). From the cloud to on-premises to the edge, AWS hybrid cloud services give a consistent AWS experience wherever we need it.

One of the most frequently posed AWS interview questions, be ready for it.  

If we have not selected the encryption option while creating the EBS volume and we have to do it afterward, we can do it using Snapshots. EBS Snapshots are a point-in-time replica of your data that can be used to facilitate data migration between regions and accounts, enable disaster recovery, and enhance backup compliance. 

Following are the steps to encrypt the volume using Snapshot: 

  1. Create a snapshot of the unencrypted root device volume. 
  2. Create a copy of that snapshot and select the encrypt option while creating the snapshot. 
  3. Create an AMI from the encrypted snapshot we created in step 2. 
  4. Use this AMI to launch new encrypted instances. 

A load-balancing service for Amazon Web Services (AWS) installations is called Elastic Load Balancing (ELB). ELB automatically adjusts resources to meet traffic demand and distributes incoming application traffic. Additionally, it aids an IT team's capacity adjustment in response to incoming application and network traffic. In order to serve users more quickly overall, load balancing distributes the workload among a number of computers. Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instance health detection is one of the improved functionalities offered by ELB.

  • Spreading only healthy routes, for instance. 
  • Flexible support for ciphers. 
  • Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate administration centralized. 
  • Public key authentication is optional. 
  • Both IPv4 and IPv6 support. 

Key features of ELB are: 

  1. Amazon's EC2 is the most well-known service that uses ELB because ELB runs a health check on each instance to make sure it is still running before directing traffic to it. ELB routes traffic to the remaining healthy EC2 instances when an instance fails or becomes unwell. 
  2. A developer can make sure enough EC2 instances are running behind an ELB by using AWS' Auto Scaling capability. 
  3. For improved network security, ELB supports apps on an Amazon Virtual Private Cloud. Whether a load balancer should be internal or external to the internet can be specified by an IT team. 
  4. Security 
  5. Automatic scaling 
  6. High availability

The following load balancer types are supported by elastic load balancing:

  • Application Load Balancers 

Applications running in the public cloud provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS) can be configured and routed using application load balancers. It distributes traffic among numerous targets located in various AWS Availability Zones. 

  • Network Load Balancers 

Using the TCP/IP networking protocol, the Network Load Balancing feature distributes traffic among numerous servers. 

NLB offers stability and performance for web servers and other mission-critical servers by joining two or more machines that are executing programs into a single virtual cluster. 

  • Gateway Load Balancers 

We may deploy, scale, and manage virtual appliances including firewalls, intrusion detection, and prevention systems, and deep packet inspection systems using Gateway Load Balancers (GLB). The network layer, the third tier of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model, is where a gateway load balancer operates. 

  • Classic Load Balancers 

It operates at both the request level and connection level and offers fundamental load balancing across several Amazon EC2 instances. Applications created on the EC2-Classic network are the target audience for Classic Load Balancer. 

This is often listed as one of the most frequently asked AWS interview questions by aspirants.

  1. For a network connection to be successful, IP addresses of the Windows adapter and network interface must coincide.
  2. Launch the terminal for Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2).
  3. The region in which we wish to create our network load balancer should be selected.
  4. We should assign our network load balancer elastic IP addresses.

Note: Ensure that we create the same amount of Elastic IP addresses for each Availability Zone that we choose to have subnets in. Refer to Elastic IP address limit for additional details. 

  1. Select Load Balancers from the Load Balancing menu.
  2. Decide to create a load balancer.
  3. Select Create for Network Load Balancer.
  4. Choose the VPC where the network load balancer will be provisioned.
  5. i. Go for the desired Availability Zone by checking the box. Availability Zone's subnet should then be chosen.
  6. A public IP address is given by the Network Load Balancer by default. If want to utilize an elastic IP address, select Choose an Elastic IP under IPv4 address.
  7. Choose an Elastic IP address from those offered in the region chosen. The interfaces of the Network Load Balancer will receive this IP address.
  8. (Optional) For each additional availability zone, repeat steps 8 through 9.
  9. The remaining stages for building a network load balancer must be followed.

A cluster is a group of servers that functions like a single system, and clustering is a technique for combining numerous computer servers into one.

An active-active cluster is possible, but it necessitates running multiple instances of SQL Server on each node. A database cluster is a group of databases that are controlled by one instance of a database server that is active.

The distribution of workloads among various computing resources, such as PCs, server clusters, network links, etc., is known as load balancing.

From the perspective of an SQL Server, load balancing doesn't exist (at least in the same sense as web server load balancing).

AWS Route 53, also known as Amazon Route 53, is a highly available and scalable Domain Name System (DNS) service that is a component of Amazon Web Services (AWS), a cloud computing platform from Amazon.com. Its name, which was first used in 2010, alludes to both the historic US Route 66 and the TCP or UDP port that DNS server requests should go via.

The URL www.wordpress.com is converted by AWS Route 53 into its corresponding numeric IP address, which in this case is 198.143.164.252. AWS Route 53 makes it easier to direct people to internet applications using cloud architecture in this way. User queries are routed through the AWS Route 53 DNS service to AWS-based infrastructures such as Amazon EC2 instances, Amazon S3 buckets, and ELB load balancers.

It's no surprise that this question pops up often in S3 interviews.

Route 53 With the help of a drag-and-drop graphical user interface, an Amazon Web Services customer can use the domain name system service Traffic Flow to describe how end-user traffic is routed to application endpoints, simplifying traffic management.
To begin the Route 53 Traffic Flow service, create a traffic control rule or a DNS entry to connect to an endpoint. To decide how traffic should be routed, Route 53 Traffic Flow uses a set of concepts. The four categories of rules are latency, geolocation, weighted failover, and failover. All guidelines can be applied to health checks, which assess whether a server is appropriate for hosting traffic.

Different types of routing policies in Route53 are:

Simple Routing Policy 

When there is only one resource performing the required function for the domain, a basic routing policy, which is a straightforward round-robin strategy, may be used. Based on the values in the resource record set, Route 53 answers DNS queries. 

Weighted Routing Policy 

Traffic is sent to separate resources according to predetermined weights, such as 75% to one server and 25% to the other, with the aid of a weighted routing policy. 

Latency-based Routing Policy 

To respond to a DNS query, a latency-based routing policy determines which data center provides us with the least amount of network latency. 

Failover Routing Policy 

In an active-passive failover arrangement, one resource (the primary) receives all traffic when it is functioning normally, and the other resource (the secondary) receives all traffic when the main is malfunctioning, which is permitted by failover routing rules. 

Geolocation Routing Policy 

To reply to DNS requests based on the users' geographic locations or the location from which the DNS requests originate, a geolocation routing policy is used. 

Geoproximity Routing Policy 

Based on the physical locations of the users and the resources, geoproximity routing assists in directing traffic to those locations. 

Multivalue Routing Policy 

Multiple values can be returned in answer to DNS requests thanks to multivalue routings, such as the IP addresses of the web servers. 

This question is a regular feature in AWS interviews, be ready to tackle it.  

Route 53 offers the user a number of advantages: 

  • Highly Available and Reliable 

Utilizing AWS's dependable and highly available architecture, AWS Route 53 was created. Because DNS servers are dispersed across numerous availability zones, consumers are regularly routed to your website. 

With a simple re-route setup when the system fails, Amazon Route 53 Traffic Flow service helps to increase reliability. 

  • Flexible 

Users of Route 53 Traffic Flow have the freedom to select traffic policies depending on a variety of factors, including endpoint health, geography, and latency. 

  • Simple 

Within minutes after your setup, Route 53 in AWS responds to your DNS queries; this is a self-service sign-up. 

  • Fast 

Route 53 distributed Low-latency services are provided by DNS servers all around the world. because they direct users to the closest available DNS server. 

  • Cost-effective 

We only pay for the services we use, such as the hosted zones that manage our domains, the number of queries handled per domain, etc. 

  • Secure 

With your AWS account, we can make each user a different set of credentials and permissions, but we must specify which sections of the service each user has access to. 

Although Amazon Route 53 is a powerful DNS service with cutting-edge functionality, it also has a number of drawbacks. Below we have mentioned of a few of them:

  1. For domains used on an on-premises network, Route 53 does not offer conditional forwarding or forwarding options. 
  2. Route 53 might become a single point of failure when combined with other AWS services. 
  3. Only minimal load balancing capabilities are offered by the features of the AWS Route 53 load balancer, which lacks advanced policy support and enterprise-class functionality. 
  4. The service is pricey for companies using Route 53 with non-AWS destinations or services. 
  5. All AWS Route 53 requests must first contact Amazon infrastructure before being redirected to outside servers. 

The configuration of AWS resources in our AWS account is shown in great detail by AWS Config. So that we can observe how the configurations and relationships alter over time, this also includes how the resources are connected to one another and how they were previously set up.

An Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instance, an Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) volume, a security group, or an Amazon Virtual Private Cloud are all examples of AWS resources (VPC). We may analyze, audit, and evaluate the configurations of our AWS resources using the service known as AWS Config. We can use it to automatically compare recorded configurations to desired setups.

Expect to come across this popular question on AWS configuration. AWS interview questions and answers like these will help you construct ideal responses during interviews.

The configuration of a resource at a specific time is known as a configuration item (CI). A CI has five sections: 

  1. Common elements of the resource's description that apply to all resource kinds (e.g., Amazon Resource Names, tags). 
  2. Configuration information for the resource (e.g., Amazon EC2 instance type). 
  3. Map of connections to other resources, such as "connected to instance" EC2 Instance i-3432ee3a by EC2:Volume vol-3434df43. 
  4. Event IDs from AWS CloudTrail that are relevant to this state. 
  5. Metadata aids in the identification of the CI's characteristics, such as the CI's version and the time it was recorded. We pay for AWS Config according to the number of configuration items (CIs) that are registered for supported resources in our AWS account. 

To assess the configuration options for our AWS resources, we use AWS Config. We can accomplish this by developing AWS Config rules, which serve as an excellent configuration setting representation. To assist us in getting started, AWS Config offers customized, pre-defined rules referred to as managed rules.

AWS Config continuously monitors the configuration changes that take place across our resources and verifies that they adhere to the criteria in our rules. AWS Config labels the resource and the rule as non-compliant if a resource does not follow the rule.

AWS Config, for instance, can check an EC2 volume against a rule that mandates volumes to be encrypted when the volume is created. AWS Config marks the volume and the rule as non-compliant if the volume is not encrypted.

We must first obtain a list of the DNS record information for our domain name. This information is typically accessible as a "zone file," which we may obtain from the current DNS provider. Once we have the DNS record information, we can build a hosted zone to store our domain name's DNS records using the Route 53 Management Console or a straightforward web-services interface.

It also entails actions like changing the domain name's nameservers to those linked to the hosted zone. We must follow the transfer procedure and get in touch with the domain name registrar used to register the domain. DNS requests will be answered as soon as registrar propagates the new name server delegations.

The following are the benefits of AWS Config: 

  • Security Analysis & Resource Administration 

It enables ongoing oversight and monitoring of resource configurations and helps us assess them for any errors that can result in security flaws or vulnerabilities. 

  • Continuous Monitoring 

This feature enables us to track and monitor in-flight configuration changes to our AWS resources. It enables us to keep track of all the AWS resources, their settings, and software configurations inside EC2 instances. We may receive an Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS) notification for our review and action after a change from a previous state is identified. 

  • Assessment on a Continuous Basis 

This feature enables us to audit and evaluate the general conformity of our AWS resource setups with our company's policies and standards. We can provide rules for building and configuring Amazon Web Services using configuration. These regulations may be provided alone or as part of a package, or "conformance pack," that includes compliance remediation measures that can be applied instantly throughout our entire company. 

  • Monitoring Compliance Throughout the Entire Organization 

With Config's multi-account, multi-region data aggregation, we can check compliance status across our organization and spot accounts that aren't in compliance. To examine the status of a particular region or account across regions, we can drill down further. Instead of having to retrieve this information separately from each account and each location, we may examine this data from the Config interface in a central account. 

Description

How to Prepare for an AWS Interview?

Keep in mind the below points while AWS interview questions: 

  1. Research the company  
  2. Don’t skip fundamental topics  
  3. Explain each AWS and its sub-concepts in detail
  4. Be prepared on some wide topics like the benefits of each AWS service, different networking concepts in AWS, various storage services in AWS, and the important databases used in AWS. To learn in-depth about these concepts, you can go for AWS certified solutions Architect training.  

Job Roles 

  • Cloud Architect 
  • Cloud Developer  
  • Cloud Systems Administrator 
  • Cloud DevOps Engineer 
  • AWS Data Architect 
  • Cloud Network Engineer 

Top Companies 

  • Amazon 
  • Oracle  
  • Accenture 
  • IBM 
  • HCL  
  • Infosys  
  • Capgemini 

Tips and Tricks for AWS Interview 

Below are some tips for AWS interview questions : 

  1. Make key points for each important AWS concept, like EC2 or S3, and try to emphasize and elaborate on these key points in the interview. 
  2. Use the STAR method: Situation, Task, Action, and Result to answer all your questions. 
  3. There will be a lot of Scenario-based questions so try to practice on some dummy AWS system or try to watch videos of practical use of the services. 
  4. Go through Amazon's Leadership Principles because questions won’t just be on AWS Technical interview questions. 
  5. Some of the major topics to prepare are AWS cloud computing interview questions, AWS Services interview questions, and AWS Troubleshooting interview questions. 

What to Expect in an AWS Interview?

  1. Behavioural-based interview questions based on leadership principles of Amazon. 
  2. A lot of questions where you will be given different scenarios, and you will have to give answers on how you will tackle those. 
  3. Many roles-specific questions for the role you are applying for in AWS. 

Summary

In the modern world, there has been a significant revolution in how businesses and organizations run. The emergence of the cloud and cloud computing platforms has played a significant role in the spread of the digital world. As a result of the fact that the majority of firms now use or plan to employ cloud computing for many of their operations, demand for cloud specialists has skyrocketed.  

Obtaining training and certification in a particular cloud computing platform, such as AWS, can open up many amazing employment opportunities as cloud computing platforms like these take the current business landscape by storm. You must go for AWS interview questions and answers and ace the interview if you want to launch an AWS career. Also, you can find more reasons to migrate to AWS Cloud Computing course. 

Amazon provides Cloud Computing with AWS. The AWS product offerings for Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS) are merged. Route 53, Simple Storage Service (S3), Simple Email Service (SES), Identity & Access Management (IAM), Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), Elastic Block Store (EBS), and CloudWatch are just a few of the parts that make up AWS. 

With the help of AWS, you can build virtual machines that come equipped with networking, device management, analytics, processing, storage, and storage capacity. You can avoid the upfront fee by using AWS's pay-as-you-go model, which lets you pay just for what you use each month. 

There has been a huge demand for AWS-certified cloud architects and experts due to the enormous skill gaps in the market. Amazon AWS is one of the top 15 certifications that individuals sign up for. It is also one of the most well-liked and lucrative IT careers in the world. Since most big businesses have either already moved their data to the cloud or are about to do so, most professionals are also wanting to advance their skills in this area. A Cloud Computing full course can help you grasp the core concepts of cloud computing without investing too much time. 

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