If you are preparing for literally any level of AWS Certification, I think an excellent first step is to identify what I term core services. These services make the foundataion of AWS and they are ALWAYS the most tested areas.
I cover these services in depth in the growing list of AWS courses at CBT Nuggets!
To simplify your locating them – I will group them just as AWS does in the main service list in your Web console.
AWS Compute
- EC2 – Elastic Compute Cloud allows you to easily scale virtual machines for your main compute horsepower; note that an opposite approach in AWS is serverless compute with Lambda
AWS Storage
- S3 – Simple Storage Services is object-based, key/value storage for many purposes in AWS
- EBS – Elastic Block Store permits the use of MDD or SDD storage for many purposes, including boot volumes for EC2 instances
AWS Database
- RDS – Relational Database Service allows you to host many database types in the cloud; this includes Oracle, MS SQL Server, and even Amazon’s own Aurora
- DynamoDB – a NoSQL database option in the cloud that performs blazing performance and on-demand scalability
- ElastiCache – creates in-memory caches for impressive performance interaction; this service also supports open standards in caching
AWS Networking
- VPC – Virtual Private Cloud provides the networking components needed for an infrastructure including subsets, gateways, routing tables, and security mechanisms
AWS Management
- CloudWatch – Permits the monitoring of key services; uses metrics and alarms for a familiar monitoring approach
- CloudTrail – Permits the tracking of potentially all the API calls to AWS; this allows you detailed analysis of all events no matter the source – Web Console, CLI, SDK, etc.
AWS Security
- IAM – Identity and Access Management allows the creation of users, groups, and roles for interacting securely with AWS
AWS Application Integration
- SNS – the Simple Notification Service allows the generation of email and text notifications based on AWS events
- SQS – the Simple Queue Service assists you in decoupling components and queuing messages between these components; this service helps the use of micro services for your processing needs