The latest AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate SAA-C03 certification actual real practice exam question and answer (Q&A) dumps are available free, which are helpful for you to pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate SAA-C03 exam and earn AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate SAA-C03 certification.
Question 1261
Exam Question
A company needs guaranteed Amazon EC2 capacity in three specific Availability Zones in a specific AWS Region for an upcoming event that will last 1 week.
What should the company do to guarantee the EC2 capacity?
A. Purchase Reserved Instances that specify the Region needed.
B. Create an On-Demand Capacity Reservation that specifies the Region needed.
C. Purchase Reserved Instances that specify the Region and three Availability Zones needed.
D. Create an On-Demand Capacity Reservation that specifies the Region and three Availability Zones needed.
Correct Answer
D. Create an On-Demand Capacity Reservation that specifies the Region and three Availability Zones needed.
Explanation
To guarantee Amazon EC2 capacity in three specific Availability Zones in a specific AWS Region for an upcoming event lasting 1 week, the company should choose option D: Create an On-Demand Capacity Reservation that specifies the Region and three Availability Zones needed.
Here’s why option D is the correct choice:
- On-Demand Capacity Reservation: Capacity Reservations allow you to reserve capacity for your EC2 instances in a specific Availability Zone within a Region. By creating an On-Demand Capacity Reservation, the company can guarantee the availability of EC2 instances in the desired Availability Zones during the event.
- Region and Availability Zone specification: The requirement states that the company needs guaranteed EC2 capacity in three specific Availability Zones within a specific Region. By creating an On-Demand Capacity Reservation, the company can specify the desired Region and the three specific Availability Zones to ensure the capacity is reserved in the required locations.
- Flexibility and control: Capacity Reservations provide the company with flexibility and control over their EC2 capacity. They can choose the instance types, tenancy, and other configuration options for the reserved capacity.
1-week duration: The requirement specifies that the event will last 1 week. With an On-Demand Capacity Reservation, the company can reserve the capacity for the exact duration needed, ensuring that it is available for the entire event period.
In summary, to guarantee EC2 capacity in three specific Availability Zones in a specific AWS Region for a week-long event, the company should create an On-Demand Capacity Reservation that specifies the Region and three Availability Zones needed. This provides the required capacity, location control, and flexibility for the event.
Question 1262
Exam Question
A company has developed a microservices application. It uses a client-facing API with Amazon API Gateway and multiple internal services hosted on Amazon EC2 instances to process user requests. The API is designed to support unpredictable surges in traffic, but internal services may become overwhelmed and unresponsive for a period of time during surges. A solutions architect needs to design a more reliable solution that reduces errors when internal services become unresponsive or unavailable.
Which solution meets these requirements?
A. Use AWS Auto Scaling to scale up internal services when there is a surge in traffic.
B. Use different Availability Zones to host internal services. Send a notification to a system administrator when an internal service becomes unresponsive.
C. Use an Elastic Load Balancer to distribute the traffic between internal services. Configure Amazon CloudWatch metrics to monitor traffic to internal services.
D. Use Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) to store user requests as they arrive. Change the internal services to retrieve the requests from the queue for processing.
Correct Answer
D. Use Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) to store user requests as they arrive. Change the internal services to retrieve the requests from the queue for processing.
Explanation
To design a more reliable solution for the microservices application, reducing errors when internal services become unresponsive or unavailable, the recommended solution is:
D. Use Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) to store user requests as they arrive. Change the internal services to retrieve the requests from the queue for processing.
Here’s why option D is the correct choice:
- Amazon SQS for reliable message queuing: Amazon SQS provides a fully managed message queuing service that decouples the client-facing API from the internal services. By using SQS to store incoming user requests, the application can ensure reliable message delivery and durability. SQS ensures that messages are stored redundantly and are not lost even if internal services become overwhelmed or unresponsive.
- Asynchronous processing and fault tolerance: By decoupling the client requests from the internal services, the application can leverage the asynchronous nature of SQS. The client-facing API can quickly add messages to the queue and return a response to the client without waiting for the internal services to process the requests immediately. This allows for fault tolerance and resilience against temporary unavailability or overload of the internal services.
- Scalability and load balancing: The client-facing API can handle unpredictable surges in traffic without overwhelming the internal services. The internal services can retrieve messages from the SQS queue at their own pace, allowing for better scalability and load balancing. This helps prevent internal services from becoming overwhelmed during traffic spikes.
- Visibility and monitoring: Amazon SQS integrates with Amazon CloudWatch, allowing you to monitor queue metrics and set up alarms based on queue depth or other metrics. This enables better visibility into the message processing flow and helps detect and address any potential bottlenecks or issues.
In summary, using Amazon SQS to store user requests and having internal services retrieve messages from the queue provides a more reliable and fault-tolerant solution. It decouples the client-facing API from the internal services, allowing for asynchronous processing, scalability, and load balancing. Additionally, integration with CloudWatch provides monitoring capabilities to ensure the system’s health and performance.
Question 1263
Exam Question
A company has a service that produces event data. The company wants to use AWS to process the event data as it is received. The data is written in a specific order that must be maintained throughout processing. The company wants to implement a solution that minimizes operational overhead.
How should a solution architect accomplish this?
A. Create an Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) FIFO queue to hold messages. Set up an AWS Lambda function to process messages from the queue.
B. Create an Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) topic to deliver notifications containing payloads to process. Configure an AWS Lambda function as a subscriber.
C. Create an Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) standard queue to hold messages. Set up an AWS Lambda function to process messages from the queue independently.
D. Create an Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) topic to deliver notifications containing payloads to process. Configure an Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) queue as a subscriber.
Correct Answer
C. Create an Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) standard queue to hold messages. Set up an AWS Lambda function to process messages from the queue independently.
Explanation
To process event data in a specific order while minimizing operational overhead, the recommended solution is:
C. Create an Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) standard queue to hold messages. Set up an AWS Lambda function to process messages from the queue independently.
Here’s why option C is the correct choice:
- Amazon SQS standard queue: By using an SQS standard queue, the messages are processed independently, allowing for parallel processing. The standard queue provides at-least-once delivery, ensuring that messages are not lost. However, the order of message processing is not guaranteed, which aligns with minimizing operational overhead.
- AWS Lambda function for message processing: Set up an AWS Lambda function to process messages retrieved from the SQS queue. AWS Lambda provides a serverless environment that automatically scales based on the incoming message load, reducing operational overhead. Each Lambda function can process a single message at a time, ensuring that the processing is independent and scalable.
- Message ordering: While SQS standard queues do not guarantee the order of message processing, if maintaining the order is crucial, the Lambda function can handle ordering logic by leveraging message attributes or metadata. The Lambda function can process and sort the messages based on the required order before performing the actual processing.
- Minimizing operational overhead: With this solution, you can leverage the fully managed services provided by AWS (SQS and Lambda) to handle the event data processing. You don’t need to manage or provision any infrastructure, reducing operational overhead. The auto-scaling nature of Lambda ensures that the system can handle varying workloads efficiently.
In summary, by using an SQS standard queue and an AWS Lambda function, you can process event data while maintaining scalability, flexibility, and minimizing operational overhead. Although the order of message processing is not guaranteed by SQS, you can implement ordering logic within the Lambda function if required.
Question 1264
Exam Question
A company is hosting 60 TB of production-level data in an Amazon S3 bucket. A solution architect needs to bring that data on premises for quarterly audit requirements. This export of data must be encrypted while in transit. The company has low network bandwidth in place between AWS and its on-premises data center.
What should the solutions architect do to meet these requirements?
A. Deploy AWS Migration Hub with 90-day replication windows for data transfer.
B. Deploy an AWS Storage Gateway volume gateway on AWS. Enable a 90-day replication window to transfer the data.
C. Deploy Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS), with lifecycle policies enabled, on AWS. Use it to transfer the data.
D. Deploy an AWS Snowball device in the on-premises data center after completing an export job request in the AWS Snowball console.
Correct Answer
D. Deploy an AWS Snowball device in the on-premises data center after completing an export job request in the AWS Snowball console.
Explanation
To meet the requirements of securely transferring 60 TB of data from an Amazon S3 bucket to an on-premises data center with low network bandwidth, the most suitable solution is:
D. Deploy an AWS Snowball device in the on-premises data center after completing an export job request in the AWS Snowball console.
Here’s why option D is the correct choice:
- AWS Snowball: AWS Snowball is a service that allows for secure and efficient data transfer between AWS and on-premises environments. It is specifically designed to handle large data transfers, making it well-suited for transferring 60 TB of data. Snowball devices are rugged, portable storage appliances that can be shipped to your location.
- Secure data transfer: Snowball devices encrypt data at rest using AES-256 encryption and provide tamper-evident seals to ensure data integrity. Additionally, Snowball supports encryption in transit, so you can securely transfer the data from the Snowball device to your on-premises data center using encrypted connections.
- Low network bandwidth: Since the company has low network bandwidth, using Snowball is an efficient solution. Instead of relying on the network for data transfer, Snowball enables you to physically ship the device to your location, avoiding the limitations of slow network speeds and reducing the time required for the transfer.
- AWS Snowball console: By completing an export job request in the AWS Snowball console, you can specify the data you want to export from the Amazon S3 bucket and generate a job. This job is then fulfilled by AWS, and the data is loaded onto the Snowball device for secure transportation to your on-premises data center.
In summary, deploying an AWS Snowball device after completing an export job request in the AWS Snowball console provides a secure and efficient way to transfer the 60 TB of data from the Amazon S3 bucket to the on-premises data center, even with low network bandwidth. The Snowball device ensures data encryption and integrity while minimizing the impact of limited network resources.
Question 1265
Exam Question
A company has an application that uses Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) to store data. The files are 1 GB in size or larger and are accessed often only for the first few days after creation. The application data is shared across a cluster of Linux servers. The company wants to reduce storage costs for the application.
What should a solutions architect do to meet these requirements?
A. Implement Amazon FSx and mount the network drive on each server.
B. Move the fees from Amazon EFS and store them locally on each Amazon EC2 instance.
C. Configure a Lifecycle policy to move the files to the EFS Infrequent Access (IA) swage class after 7 days.
D. Move the files to Amazon S3 with S3 lifecycle policies enabled. Rewrite the application to support mounting the S3 bucket.
Correct Answer
C. Configure a Lifecycle policy to move the files to the EFS Infrequent Access (IA) swage class after 7 days.
Explanation
To meet the requirements of reducing storage costs for the application that uses Amazon Elastic File System (Amazon EFS) while optimizing file access patterns, the most suitable solution is:
C. Configure a Lifecycle policy to move the files to the EFS Infrequent Access (IA) storage class after 7 days.
Here’s why option C is the correct choice:
- Amazon EFS Infrequent Access (IA): Amazon EFS provides an Infrequent Access storage class that offers lower-cost storage for files that are accessed less frequently. By configuring a Lifecycle policy, you can automatically transition files to the IA storage class after a specified duration (in this case, 7 days).
- File access pattern: The requirement states that the files are accessed often only for the first few days after creation. By transitioning the files to the IA storage class after 7 days, you can take advantage of the reduced storage costs while still maintaining accessibility during the initial period of high usage.
- EFS shared across Linux servers: Amazon EFS allows for file sharing across multiple Linux servers in a cluster. By utilizing the IA storage class, you can optimize storage costs for the shared files without sacrificing the ability to access them from the cluster.
In summary, configuring a Lifecycle policy to move the files in Amazon EFS to the Infrequent Access (IA) storage class after 7 days allows you to reduce storage costs while still accommodating the access patterns of the application. This solution provides an efficient and cost-effective way to manage the application data stored in Amazon EFS.
Question 1266
Exam Question
A company uses Amazon S3 to store its confidential audit documents. The S3 bucket uses bucket policies to restrict access to audit team IAM user credentials according to the principle of least privilege. Company managers are worried about accidental deletion of documents in the S3 bucket and want a more secure solution.
What should a solutions architect do to secure the audit documents?
A. Enable the versioning and MFA Delete features on the S3 bucket.
B. Enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) on the IAM user credentials for each audit team IAM user account.
C. Add an S3 Lifecycle policy to the audit team’s IAM user accounts to deny the s3:DeleteObject action during audit dates.
D. Use AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) to encrypt the S3 bucket and restrict audit team IAM user accounts from accessing the KMS key.
Correct Answer
A. Enable the versioning and MFA Delete features on the S3 bucket.
Explanation
To secure the audit documents stored in an Amazon S3 bucket and protect against accidental deletion, the recommended solution is:
A. Enable the versioning and MFA Delete features on the S3 bucket.
Here’s why option A is the correct choice:
- Versioning: By enabling versioning on the S3 bucket, each new version of an object will be stored and assigned a unique version ID. This ensures that previous versions of the objects can be retained even if newer versions are uploaded or overwritten.
- MFA Delete: Enabling MFA Delete adds an extra layer of security by requiring multi-factor authentication (MFA) for certain high-risk actions, such as deleting objects from the S3 bucket. MFA adds an additional level of protection against accidental or unauthorized deletions by requiring a physical token or a virtual device in addition to IAM user credentials.
By combining versioning and MFA Delete, you can achieve a more secure solution for the audit documents stored in the S3 bucket. This ensures that previous versions of the documents are retained and protected from accidental or malicious deletions. It provides an extra layer of protection while still allowing authorized users with the necessary MFA credentials to perform deletion actions when required.
Options B, C, and D do not directly address the concern of accidental deletion of documents or provide the same level of protection as enabling versioning and MFA Delete on the S3 bucket.
Question 1267
Exam Question
A company is running a multi-tier ecommerce web application in the AWS Cloud. The application runs on Amazon EC2 Instances with an Amazon RDS MySQL Multi-AZ DB instance. Amazon RDS is configured with the latest generation instance with 2,000 GB of storage in an Amazon EBS General Purpose SSD (gp2) volume. The database performance impacts the application during periods of high demand. After analyzing the logs in Amazon CloudWatch Logs, a database administrator finds that the application performance always degrades when the number of read and write IOPS is higher than 6.000.
What should a solutions architect do to improve the application performance?
A. Replace the volume with a Magnetic volume.
B. Increase the number of IOPS on the gp2 volume.
C. Replace the volume with a Provisioned IOPS (PIOPS) volume.
D. Replace the 2,000 GB gp2 volume with two 1,000 GBgp2 volumes.
Correct Answer
C. Replace the volume with a Provisioned IOPS (PIOPS) volume.
Explanation
To improve the application performance in this scenario, the recommended solution is:
C. Replace the volume with a Provisioned IOPS (PIOPS) volume.
Here’s why option C is the correct choice:
The application is experiencing performance degradation when the number of read and write IOPS exceeds 6,000. This indicates that the current General Purpose SSD (gp2) volume may not be able to sustain the required IOPS for the workload.
Provisioned IOPS (PIOPS) volumes are specifically designed to deliver predictable and consistent performance for database workloads. By replacing the existing gp2 volume with a PIOPS volume, you can allocate a specific number of IOPS based on the workload requirements. This ensures that the database has sufficient IOPS to handle the high demand periods without degradation in performance.
To implement this solution, you would need to:
- Create a new PIOPS volume with the desired size and the necessary number of provisioned IOPS to meet the workload requirements.
- Take a snapshot of the existing RDS MySQL Multi-AZ DB instance.
- Restore the snapshot to a new DB instance and specify the newly created PIOPS volume as the storage option.
- Update the application configuration to point to the new DB instance.
By using a PIOPS volume, you can provide the necessary performance to handle the high-demand periods and improve the application’s overall performance.
Options A and B are not suitable because replacing the gp2 volume with a Magnetic volume (option A) would likely result in lower performance, and increasing the number of IOPS on the gp2 volume (option B) may not provide sustained performance beyond the limits of gp2.
Option D, splitting the volume into two separate gp2 volumes, does not address the issue of performance degradation due to high IOPS. It would only provide additional storage space without improving the underlying performance characteristics.
Question 1268
Exam Question
A solutions architect is designing a new API using Amazon API Gateway that will receive requests from users. The volume of requests is highly variable; several hours can pass without receiving a single request. The data processing will take place asynchronously, but should be completed within a few seconds after a request is made.
Which compute service should the solutions architect have the API invoke to deliver the requirements at the lowest cost?
A. An AWS Glue job
B. An AWS Lambda function
C. A containerized service hosted in Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS)
D. A containerized service hosted in Amazon ECS with Amazon EC2
Correct Answer
B. An AWS Lambda function
Explanation
The most suitable compute service to deliver the requirements at the lowest cost in this scenario is:
B. An AWS Lambda function.
Here’s why option B is the correct choice:
AWS Lambda is a serverless compute service that allows you to run code without provisioning or managing servers. It is designed to handle variable workloads, scale automatically, and execute code in a highly available and fault-tolerant manner. Lambda functions are ideal for asynchronous and event-driven workloads, making them well-suited for the given requirements.
By invoking an AWS Lambda function from Amazon API Gateway, you can achieve the following benefits:
- On-demand scaling: Lambda automatically scales up to handle concurrent requests as they arrive, ensuring that processing can be completed within a few seconds after a request is made. When there are no requests, there are no costs incurred for idle resources.
- Cost efficiency: With Lambda, you only pay for the actual compute time consumed by your function, measured in milliseconds. This pay-per-use model ensures that costs are directly aligned with the actual workload.
- Simplified management: Lambda takes care of server and infrastructure management, allowing you to focus on developing and deploying your code. You don’t need to provision or manage any servers or containers.
Options A, C, and D involve more traditional compute services that require infrastructure provisioning and management. They may not provide the same level of cost efficiency and ease of scalability as AWS Lambda for highly variable workloads.
Therefore, choosing AWS Lambda as the compute service to process the API requests would deliver the requirements at the lowest cost while providing the necessary scalability and simplicity.
Question 1269
Exam Question
A company wants to build an online marketplace application on AWS as a set of loosely coupled microservices. For this application, when a customer submits a new order, two microservices should handle the event simultaneously. The Email microservice will send a confirmation email, and the OrderProcessing microservice will start the order delivery process. If a customer cancels an order, the OrderCancelation and Email microservices should handle the event simultaneously. A solutions architect wants to use Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) and Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) to design the messaging between the microservices.
How should the solutions architect design the solution?
A. Create a single SQS queue and publish order events to it. The Email OrderProcessing and Order Cancellation microservices can then consume messages of the queue.
B. Create three SNS topics for each microservice. Publish order events to the three topics. Subscribe each of the Email OrderProcessing and Order Cancellation microservices to its own topic.
C. Create an SNS topic and publish order events to it. Create three SQS queues for the Email OrderProcessing and Order Cancellation microservices. Subscribe all SQS queues to the SNS topic with message filtering.
D. Create two SQS queues and publish order events to both queues simultaneously. One queue is for the Email and OrderProcessing microservices. The second queue is for the Email and Order Cancellation microservices.
Correct Answer
C. Create an SNS topic and publish order events to it. Create three SQS queues for the Email OrderProcessing and Order Cancellation microservices. Subscribe all SQS queues to the SNS topic with message filtering.
Explanation
The most appropriate design for the given requirements is:
C. Create an SNS topic and publish order events to it. Create three SQS queues for the Email, OrderProcessing, and Order Cancellation microservices. Subscribe all SQS queues to the SNS topic with message filtering.
Here’s why option C is the correct choice:
To achieve simultaneous handling of order events by multiple microservices, a combination of Amazon SNS and Amazon SQS can be used. Amazon SNS provides pub/sub messaging capabilities, while Amazon SQS provides reliable and scalable message queues.
In this scenario, you can design the solution as follows:
- Create an SNS topic: Set up a single SNS topic where order events are published. The SNS topic acts as a central hub for distributing messages to multiple subscribers.
- Create SQS queues: Set up three SQS queues, one for each microservice (Email, OrderProcessing, and Order Cancellation). Each microservice will have its own dedicated queue to consume messages.
- Subscribe SQS queues to SNS topic: Subscribe each of the three SQS queues to the SNS topic. This allows the queues to receive messages published to the SNS topic.
- Implement message filtering: Configure message filtering on the SNS topic so that each microservice only receives the relevant messages based on message attributes. For example, the Email microservice will receive order confirmation messages, the OrderProcessing microservice will receive all order events, and the Order Cancellation microservice will receive order cancellation messages.
By using this design, when a customer submits a new order, the order event is published to the SNS topic. The Email and OrderProcessing microservices will each receive the relevant messages via their respective SQS queues and can process them simultaneously. Similarly, when an order is canceled, the Order Cancellation and Email microservices will receive the appropriate messages.
Option C provides the necessary decoupling between microservices, ensuring that they can independently consume and process messages from the SNS topic. It allows for parallel processing of events by multiple microservices, enabling simultaneous handling of order events as required.
Question 1270
Exam Question
A company hosts its application in the AWS Cloud. The application runs on Amazon EC2 instances behind an Elastic Load Balancer in an Auto Scaling group and with an Amazon DynamoDB table. The company wants to ensure the application can be made available in another AWS Region with minimal downtime.
What should a solutions architect do to meet these requirements with the LEAST amount of downtime?
A. Create an Auto Scaling group and a load balancer in the disaster recovery Region. Configure the DynamoDB table as a global table. Configure DNS failover to point to the new disaster recovery Region’s load balancer.
B. Create an AWS CloudFormation template to create EC2 instances, load balancers, and DynamoDB tables to be executed when needed. Configure DNS failover to point to the new disaster recovery Region’s load balancer.
C. Create an AWS CloudFormation template to create EC2 instances and a load balancer to be executed when needed. Configure the DynamoDB table as a global table. Configure DNS failover to point to the new disaster recovery Region’s load balancer.
D. Create an Auto Scaling group and load balancer in the disaster recovery Region. Configure the DynamoDB table as a global table. Create an Amazon CloudWatch alarm to trigger an AWS Lambda function that updates Amazon Route 53 pointing to the disaster recovery load balancer.
Correct Answer
D. Create an Auto Scaling group and load balancer in the disaster recovery Region. Configure the DynamoDB table as a global table. Create an Amazon CloudWatch alarm to trigger an AWS Lambda function that updates Amazon Route 53 pointing to the disaster recovery load balancer.
Explanation
To achieve the goal of making the application available in another AWS Region with minimal downtime, the most appropriate solution is:
D. Create an Auto Scaling group and load balancer in the disaster recovery Region. Configure the DynamoDB table as a global table. Create an Amazon CloudWatch alarm to trigger an AWS Lambda function that updates Amazon Route 53 pointing to the disaster recovery load balancer.
Here’s why option D is the correct choice:
- Create an Auto Scaling group and load balancer in the disaster recovery Region: Set up an Auto Scaling group with Amazon EC2 instances and an Elastic Load Balancer in the disaster recovery Region. This allows for scalability and distribution of traffic across multiple instances.
- Configure the DynamoDB table as a global table: Configure the existing DynamoDB table as a global table. This enables automatic replication of the table to multiple AWS Regions, including the disaster recovery Region. It ensures data consistency and availability across Regions.
- Create an Amazon CloudWatch alarm: Set up an Amazon CloudWatch alarm to monitor the health of the application in the primary Region. This alarm should detect any disruptions or failures in the primary Region.
- Trigger an AWS Lambda function to update Amazon Route 53: Configure the CloudWatch alarm to trigger an AWS Lambda function when an alarm state is reached. This Lambda function should update the DNS configuration in Amazon Route 53 to point to the load balancer in the disaster recovery Region.
By following this approach, the application can be made available in another AWS Region with minimal downtime:
- In normal operation, the application runs in the primary Region, serving traffic through the load balancer and accessing the DynamoDB table in the same Region.
- If a failure or disruption is detected in the primary Region by the CloudWatch alarm, the Lambda function is triggered to update the DNS configuration in Route 53. This update redirects traffic to the load balancer in the disaster recovery Region.
- With the DNS update, traffic is seamlessly routed to the application in the disaster recovery Region, which utilizes the replicated DynamoDB table to ensure data availability.
Option D provides a comprehensive approach that combines the use of Auto Scaling, load balancing, global DynamoDB tables, and DNS failover. It ensures minimal downtime during the failover process and enables the application to be made available in another AWS Region when needed.
