This course teaches systems operators and anyone performing cloud operations functions how to manage and operate automatable and repeatable deployments of networks and systems on AWS. You will learn about cloud operations functions, such as installing, configuring, automating, monitoring, securing, maintaining, and troubleshooting these services, networks, and systems. The course also covers specific AWS features, tools, and best practices related to these functions.

• Course level: Intermediate
• Duration: 3 days

Activities

This course includes presentations, hands-on labs, demonstrations, and group discussions.

Course Objectives

In this course, you will learn to:

• Identify the AWS services that support the different phases of Operational Excellence, an AWS Well-Architected Framework pillar
• Implement monitoring, logging, and alerting solutions using Amazon CloudWatch, AWS CloudTrail, Amazon EventBridge, and the AWS DevOps Agent to proactively identify and remediate operational issues
• Design and implement highly available, scalable, and resilient architectures using Auto Scaling, Elastic Load Balancing, Multi-AZ deployments, and disaster recovery strategies
• Automate infrastructure provisioning and operational tasks using AWS CloudFormation, AWS CDK, and AWS Systems Manager to reduce manual effort and ensure consistency
• Apply security best practices and compliance controls, including IAM policies, encryption, secrets management, and continuous monitoring using AWS security services
• Configure, optimize, and troubleshoot VPC networking, DNS, and content delivery to ensure reliable connectivity and optimal performance for AWS workloads
• State the purpose, benefits, and appropriate use cases for mountable storage in your AWS Cloud environment
• Explain the operational characteristics of object storage in the AWS Cloud, including Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) and Amazon S3 Glacier

Intended Audience

This course is intended for:

• System administrators and operators who are operating in the AWS Cloud
• Informational technology workers who want to increase their cloud operations knowledge

Prerequisites

We recommend that attendees of this course have:

• Successfully completed the AWS Technical Essentials course
• A background in software development or systems administration
• Proficiency in maintaining operating systems at the command line, such as shell scripting in Linux environments or cmd/PowerShell in Windows
• Basic knowledge of networking protocols (TCP/IP, HTTP)

Course Outline

Module 0: Course Introduction

Module 1: Intro to Cloud Operations

• Well-Architected Framework

Module 2: Access Management

• Access management
• Authentication
• Authorization
• Best practices for IAM
• Resources, accounts, and AWS Organizations
• Using AWS Control Tower for multi-account management

Module 3: System Discovery

• Methods for interacting with AWS services
• Developing a tagging strategy
• Tools for automating resource management
• Tracking resource configuration
• Lab 1: Auditing AWS Resources with AWS Systems Manager and AWS Config

Module 4: Monitor and Maintain System Health

• Monitoring and maintaining healthy workloads
• Metrics
• CloudWatch dashboards
• CloudWatch Logs
• Application Performance Monitoring (APM)
• Specialized monitoring lenses

Module 5: Alerts, Events, and Responses

• CloudWatch alarms
• Events and event-driven responses
• Monitoring AWS infrastructure
• Cost and usage awareness
• Lab 2: Monitor applications and infrastructure

Module 6: Operating Secure and Resilient Networks

• Amazon VPC
• Connecting your VPC to other networks
• Monitoring with Amazon VPC Flow Logs
• Networking beyond the VPC
• Operating a secure network

Module 7: Configure Highly Available Systems

• Elastic Load Balancing
• Amazon Route 53
• Disaster recovery
• Lab 3: Networking

Module 8: Deploying and Scaling Compute Resources

• Using AMIs for deployment
• Scaling highly available systems
• Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling
• Auto Scaling groups
• Scaling policies
• Scaling containerized workloads

Module 9: Optimizing Compute for Performance and Cost

• Optimizing Compute for Performance and Cost

Module 10: Managing Storage Resources

• Block storage
• Amazon EBS snapshots
• Object storage with Amazon S3
• Amazon S3 tiers and lifecycle rules
• Shared file system storage
• Protecting data with AWS Backup
• Lab 4: Automating with AWS Backup for Archiving and Recovery

Module 11: Operating Resilient Databases

• Database scaling and performance
• Database availability and recovery

Module 12: Automate Resource Deployment

• Infrastructure as Code
• Deployment using CloudFormation
• CloudFormation template components
• Efficiency tools for templates
• Provisioning errors and rollbacks
• AWS Cloud Development Kit (AWS CDK)
• Best practices
• Lab 5: Deploy and Reconcile Infrastructure with AWS CDK

Module 13: Manage Resources

• AWS Systems Manager
• Operations tools
• Application tools
• Change management tools
• Node tools
• Lab 6: Operations as code

Module 14: Security and System Auditing

• Managing encryption
• Store and retrieve secrets
• Permissions management
• Auditing activity and configuration
• Threat detection and posture management

Module 15: Incident Response and Automated Remediation

• Incident response and automated remediation
• AWS DevOps Agent
• Lab 7: Capstone lab for CloudOps

Module 16: Course Wrap-up