Purpose-Built Databases

AWS offers a variety of database services tailored to specific use cases, enabling you to choose the best tool for your application's needs.

In this lesson, we will cover the following services before learning about Multi-AZ and Read Replicas:

Amazon RDS (Relational Database Service)

Amazon RDS is a managed relational database service that supports multiple database engines, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, Oracle, and Microsoft SQL Server. It simplifies database administration tasks such as hardware provisioning, database setup, patching, and backups. RDS is ideal for applications that require complex queries, transactions, and adherence to relational data models. By automating time-consuming administrative tasks, RDS allows you to focus on application development and optimization.

Amazon Aurora

Amazon Aurora is a high-performance, cloud-native relational database compatible with MySQL and PostgreSQL. It offers the security, availability, and reliability of commercial databases at a fraction of the cost. Aurora is designed for scalability, automatically increasing storage capacity up to 128 terabytes as needed. It delivers up to five times better performance than standard MySQL databases and three times better than PostgreSQL databases. Aurora is suitable for enterprise applications demanding high throughput and scalability.

Amazon DynamoDB

Amazon DynamoDB is a fully managed NoSQL database service providing fast and predictable performance with seamless scalability. It is designed for applications requiring consistent, single-digit millisecond latency at any scale. DynamoDB is a key-value and document database that excels in handling high-volume workloads, such as gaming, IoT, real-time analytics, and mobile applications. It eliminates the complexities of operating and scaling distributed databases, allowing developers to focus on building high-performance applications.

Amazon Redshift

Amazon Redshift is a fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehousing service that simplifies analyzing large amounts of data using existing business intelligence tools. Redshift uses columnar storage technology and massively parallel processing to run complex analytical queries quickly. It is ideal for big data analytics, reporting, and dashboarding, supporting data-driven decision-making within organizations by delivering fast query performance on large datasets.

Scaling Databases

Scaling databases is essential to maintain performance and accommodate growth. AWS provides mechanisms to scale databases based on your application's requirements.

We will discuss the following scaling options:

Read Replicas

Read Replicas allow you to create one or more copies of your database instance within the same AWS Region or across Regions. They are used to offload read traffic from the primary database, improving read scalability and performance.

Read Replicas are ideal when your application experiences heavy read traffic that exceeds the capacity of a single database instance, and you need to scale reads horizontally.

Multi-AZ Deployments

Multi-AZ (Availability Zone) deployments improve high availability by automatically replicating data synchronously to a standby instance in a different Availability Zone within the same Region.

It's important to note that Multi-AZ deployments do not improve read scalability because the standby instance cannot serve read traffic. They are focused on enhancing availability and data durability.

Choosing Between Read Replicas and Multi-AZ

When deciding between Read Replicas and Multi-AZ deployments, consider the following:

Understanding the differences between Read Replicas and Multi-AZ deployments allows you to architect your database layer effectively to meet specific performance and availability requirements.

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