What is NoSQL?

High-performance, non-relational databases.

NoSQL is a term used to describe high-performance, non-relational databases. NoSQL databases utilize a
variety of data models, including document, graph, key-value, and columnar. NoSQL databases are widely
recognized for ease of development, scalable performance, high availability, and resilience. Below are several
resources to help you get started using NoSQL databases.

Download the whitepaper Migration Best Practices - RDBMS to Amazon DynamoDB.

SQL vs NoSQL Database Comparison

  Relational database NoSQL database
Non-relational (NoSQL) databases
The relational model normalizes data into tabular
typically do not enforce a schema. A
structures known as tables, which consist of rows
partition key is generally used to retrieve
Data model and columns. A schema strictly defines the tables,
values, column sets, or semi-structured
columns, indexes, relationships between tables,
JSON, XML, or other documents
and other database elements.
containing related item attributes.
Traditional relational database management
NoSQL databases often trade some ACID
systems (RDBMS) support a set of properties
properties of traditional relational database
defined by the acronym ACID: Atomicity,
management systems (RDBMS) for a more
Consistency, Isolation, and Durability. Atomicity
flexible data model that scales horizontally.
means “all or nothing” – a transaction executes
These characteristics make NoSQL
ACID completely or not at all. Consistency means once
databases an excellent choice in situations
properties a transaction has been committed, the data must
where traditional RDBMS encounter
conform to the database schema. Isolation
architectural challenges to overcome some
requires that concurrent transactions execute
combination of performance bottlenecks,
separately from one another. Durability is the
scalability, operational complexity, and
ability to recover from an unexpected system
increasing administration and support costs.
failure or power outage to the last known state.
Performance is generally dependent on the disk
Performance is generally a function of the
subsystem. Optimization of queries, indexes, and
Performance underlying hardware cluster size, network
table structure is required to achieve peak
latency, and the calling application.
performance.
Easiest to scale “up” with faster hardware.  Designed to scale “out” using distributed
Scale Additional investments are required for relational clusters of low-cost hardware to increase
tables to span a distributed system. throughput without increasing latency.
Object-based APIs allow app developers to
Requests to store and retrieve data are
easily store and retrieve in-memory data
communicated using queries which conform to a
structures. Partition keys let apps look up
APIs structured query language (SQL). These queries
key-value pairs, column sets, or semi-
are parsed and executed by relational database
structured documents containing serialized
management systems (RDBMS).
app objects and attributes.
NoSQL databases generally offer tools to
SQL databases generally offer a rich set of tools
manage clusters and scaling. Applications
Tools for simplifying the development of database-
are the primary interface to the underlying
driven applications.
data.
Types of NoSQL Databases on AWS
Columnar Databases
Columnar databases are optimized for reading and writing columns of data as opposed to rows of data. Column-
oriented storage for database tables is an important factor in analytic query performance because it drastically
reduces the overall disk I/O requirements and reduces the amount of data you need to load from disk. Learn
more »

Document Databases
Document databases are designed to store semi-structured data as documents, typically in JSON or XML
format. Unlike traditional relational databases, the schema for each non-relational (NoSQL) document can vary,
giving you more flexibility in organizing and storing application data and reducing storage required for optional
values. Learn more »

Graph Databases
Graph databases store vertices and directed links called edges. Graphs can be built on relational (SQL) and non-
relational (NoSQL) databases. Vertices and edges can each have properties associated with them. The diagram
below depicts a simple graph of relationships between friends and their interests. Learn more »

In-Memory Key-Value Stores

In-memory key-value stores are NoSQL databases optimized for read-heavy application workloads (such as
social networking, gaming, media sharing and Q&A portals) or compute-intensive workloads (such as a
recommendation engine). In-memory caching improves application performance by storing critical pieces of
data in memory for low-latency access. Learn more »

SQL vs NoSQL Terminology

SQL MongoDB DynamoDB Cassandra Couchbase
Table Collection Table Table Data Bucket
Row Document Item Row Document
Column Field Attribute Column Field
Primary Key ObjectId Primary Key Primary Key Document ID
Index Index Secondary Index Index Index
View View Global Secondary Index Materialized View View
Nested Table or Object Embedded Document Map Map Map
Array Array List List List

What is a Columnar Database?

A columnar database is optimized for reading and writing columns of data as opposed to rows of data. Column-
oriented storage for database tables is an important factor in analytic query performance because it drastically
reduces the overall disk I/O requirements and reduces the amount of data you need to load from disk.

Like other NoSQL databases, column-oriented databases are designed to scale “out” using distributed clusters
of low-cost hardware to increase throughput, making them ideal for data warehousing and Big Data processing.
Columnar Databases on AWS
Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides a variety of columnar database options for developers. You can operate
your own non-relational columnar data store in the cloud on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EBS, work with AWS
solution providers, or take advantage of fully managed columnar database services.

Amazon Redshift
Amazon Redshift is a column-oriented, fully managed, petabyte-scale data warehouse that makes it simple and
cost-effective to analyze all your data using your existing business intelligence tools. Amazon Redshift achieves
efficient storage and optimum query performance through a combination of massively parallel processing,
columnar data storage, and very efficient, targeted data compression encoding schemes. Learn more about
Amazon Redshift »

Columnar Databases on Amazon EC2 or Amazon EMR

Developers may install column-oriented databases of their choice on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EMR, which
means developers avoid the friction of infrastructure provisioning while gaining access to a variety of standard
columnar database engines.

Apache Cassandra
Cassandra is an open source, column-oriented database designed to handle large amounts of data across many
commodity servers. Unlike a table in a relational database, different rows in the same table (column family) do
not have to share the same set of columns.

See a multi-region Cassandra configuration with a look inside Vidora’s globally distributed, low-latency A.I.

Consider EBS when running Cassandra workloads (learn how CrowdStrike ran dense, cheaper Cassandra
clusters with EBS). For more about working with Cassandra and running Cassandra on AWS, read the Apache
Cassandra on AWS whitepaper and visit the AWS Marketplace » 

59:36

Best Practices for Running Apache Cassandra on AWS

Apache HBase
Apache HBase is an open-source, column-oriented, distributed NoSQL database. HBase runs on the Apache
Hadoop framework. HBase provides you a fault-tolerant, efficient way of storing large quantities of sparse data
using column-based compression and storage.
You can deploy HBase on Amazon Elastic Cloud Compute (Amazon EC2) and manage it yourself or leverage
Apache HBase as a managed service on Amazon Elastic MapReduce (Amazon EMR).  Learn more by reading
the EMR Developer Guide and this post on the AWS Big Data Blog »

What is a Document Database?

A document database is designed to store semi-structured data as documents, typically in JSON or XML format.
Unlike traditional relational databases, the schema for each non-relational (NoSQL) document can vary, giving
Developers, Database Administrators, and IT Professionals more flexibility in organizing and storing
application data and reducing storage required for optional values.

JSON document support makes it easier for Developers to serialize and load objects containing relevant
properties and data. NoSQL databases are designed to scale “out” using distributed clusters of low-cost
hardware to increase throughput without increasing latency.

Document Databases on AWS

Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides a number of non-relational (NoSQL) document database options. You
can operate your own non-relational document data store in the cloud on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EBS, work
with AWS solution providers, or take advantage of fully managed non-relational services.

Amazon DynamoDB is a fully managed NoSQL document database service that provides extremely fast and
predictable performance with seamless scalability. Running your own NoSQL cloud databases on Amazon EC2
and Amazon EBS gives you full control over your database without the burden of provisioning and installing
hardware.

In addition, AWS has partnered with MongoDB and Couchbase, both of whom provide support and training for
customers running their products on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EBS.

Amazon DynamoDB
Amazon DynamoDB is a fully managed document database service running in the AWS cloud that provides
extremely fast and predictable performance with seamless scalability. DynamoDB is a fast and flexible NoSQL
database service for applications that need consistent, single-digit millisecond latency at any scale. It is a fully
managed database and supports both document and key-value data models. Its flexible data model and reliable
performance make it a great fit for mobile, web, gaming, ad-tech, the Internet of things (IoT), and many other
applications. Get started with DynamoDB.

See these recent whitepapers and blog posts to learn more about DynamoDB:

 IDC: Achieving Cloud-Based Digitial Transformation Customer Successes with Amazon DynamoDB
 Tweaking DynamoDB Tables for Fun and Profit
 Simple REST API For DynamoDB Using Lambda
 Amazon DynamoDB at AWS re:Invent 2016—Wrap-Up
 Should Your DynamoDB Table Be Normalized or Denormalized?
 SaaS Storage Strategies - Building a Multitenant Storage Model on AWS
 Here's the Tech That Powered the World Series Stats Machine
  How We Built a SaaS Solution on AWS, by CrowdTangle
 To SQL or NoSQL
 Medium’s DynamoDB Data Source for Apache Spark
 Serverless Architectures with Java 8, AWS Lambda, and Amazon DynamoDB — Part 1
 Serverless Architectures with Java 8, AWS Lambda, and Amazon DynamoDB — Part 2
 How Signiant Uses AWS Lambda and Amazon DynamoDB to run its SaaS Solution on AWS
 Maintain a Healthy Email Database with AWS Lambda, Amazon SNS, and Amazon DynamoDB .

Redfin Uses Amazon DynamoDB to Accelerate Lookups of Similar Listings From 2 Secs to 12 Milliseconds

55:54

AWS re:Invent 2016: Deep Dive on Amazon DynamoDB (DAT304)

Document Databases on Amazon EC2 and EBS

Developers may install document databases of their choice on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EBS. An Amazon
EC2 instance can be used to run a document database which means developers avoid the friction of
infrastructure provisioning while gaining access to a variety of standard document database engines.

Cassandra
Cassandra is an open source distributed document database designed to handle large amounts of data across
many commodity servers, providing high availability with no single point of failure. Consider EBS when
running Cassandra workloads (learn how CrowdStrike ran dense, cheaper Cassandra clusters with EBS).

For more about working with Cassandra and running Cassandra on AWS, read the Apache Cassandra on AWS
whitepaper and visit the AWS Marketplace » 

Couchbase
Couchbase develops and supports Couchbase Server, a high-performance distributed key-value store.
Couchbase delivers support, services, and training for commercial-grade deployments of Couchbase Server on
AWS. Learn more about working with Couchbase and running Couchbase Server on AWS »

MarkLogic
MarkLogic Corporation develops MarkLogic Server (MarkLogic), an Enterprise NoSQL database platform that
is fully scalable and provides ACID (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, and Durability) transactions for large
datasets. For an overview of best practices and scaling, see the whitepaper MarkLogic on AWS »

MongoDB
MongoDB, Inc. develops and supports MongoDB, an open source, high performance document-oriented
database. MongoDB Inc. delivers technical support, professional services, and training for commercial-grade
deployments of MongoDB.

Use the AWS MongoDB Quick Start (also available in PDF format) to deploy a multi-node MongoDB cluster
in the AWS cloud, following AWS best practices, in approximately 15 minutes.

For an overview of MongoDB and its implementation on AWS, see the whitepaper MongoDB on AWS:
Guidelines and Best Practices. Also, be sure to review AWS security recommendations for MongoDB as well as
the security section of the MongoDB documentation.

For more about working with MongoDB Inc. and running MongoDB on AWS, see the information in the AWS
Partner Directory and read how Organizations Realize Transformative Benefits with MongoDB on AWS.

What is a Graph Database?

A graph database stores vertices and directed links called edges. Graphs can be built on relational (SQL) and
non-relational (NoSQL) databases. Vertices and edges can each have properties associated with them. The
diagram below depicts a simple graph of relationships between friends and their interests. To learn more about
graph databases, read the AWS Activate blog post »

Graph Databases on AWS

Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides a variety of graph

database options. You can operate your graph database in the
cloud on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EBS and work with
Amazon solution providers.

Titan
Titan is a popular graph database designed to efficiently store and traverse both small and large graphs up to
hundreds of billions of vertices and edges. Titan enables scalability through a pluggable storage engine
architecture.

The Amazon DynamoDB Storage Backend for Titan enables you to store Titan graphs of any size in fully-
managed DynamoDB tables. With the DynamoDB storage backend plugin for Titan, you can offload Titan
storage management to AWS. Titan’s pluggable architecture makes it easy to start using DynamoDB without
changing your application.

Titan supports Tinkerpop, a collection of graph processing and analysis tools, including Gremlin and
Blueprints. For more information, see the Working with Graph Databases section of our Documentation »

Neo4j
Neo4j offers a shared-nothing architecture with a single write master and multiple read replicas. Neo4j supports
its own Cypher query language as well as Gremlin. To give it a try, launch a Neo4j test drive from our big data
page »

OrientDB
OrientDB supports schema-less, schema-full, and schema-mixed modes. It includes support for SQL and
extends the language to support concepts such as trees and graphs. To get started using OrientDB, visit the
AWS Marketplace »
GraphDB
GraphDB is a resource description framework (RDF) graph database that supports text mining, SPARQL
queries, semantic annotation, and semantic search. To get started using GraphDB, visit the AWS Marketplace »

In-Memory Key-Value Stores on AWS

Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides a variety of in-memory key-value database options. You can operate
your own non-relational key-value data store in the cloud on Amazon EC2 and Amazon EBS, work with
Amazon solution providers, or take advantage of fully managed non-relational services.

In-Memory Key-Value Stores on Amazon ElastiCache

Amazon ElastiCache is a web service that makes it easy to deploy, operate, and scale an in-memory cache in the
cloud. The service improves the performance of web applications by allowing you to retrieve information from
fast, managed, in-memory caches, instead of relying entirely on slower disk-based databases.

Amazon ElastiCache automatically detects and replaces failed nodes, reducing the overhead associated with
self-managed infrastructures and provides a resilient system that mitigates the risk of overloaded cloud
databases, which slow website and application load times. Through integration with Amazon CloudWatch,
Amazon ElastiCache provides enhanced visibility into key performance metrics associated with your
Memcached or Redis nodes.

ElastiCache supports two open-source in-memory caching engines. For more information, see the Amazon
ElastiCache detail page »

Memcached
Memcached a widely adopted memory object caching system. ElastiCache is protocol compliant with
Memcached, so popular tools that you use today with existing Memcached environments will work seamlessly
with the service.

Redis
Redis is a popular open-source in-memory key-value store that supports data structures such as sorted sets and
lists. Leading use patterns for Redis include caching, session management, pub/sub, and leaderboards.
ElastiCache for Redis is a Redis-compatible in-memory data structure service that supports Master/Slave
replication and Multi-Availability Zone to achieve cross-AZ redundancy with Automatic Failover to a read
replica. It also includes Amazon’s enhancements to the Redis engine for improved robustness and stability.

Learn how you can Manage IoT and Time Series data with Amazon ElastiCache for Redis.
Aerospike
Aerospike is an open source, in-memory key-value store.  This high-performance NoSQL database can be
installed as a persistent in-memory service with a RAM cluster, or greater data sizes using local SSD instances
which are also persisted to EBS.  For more information on running Aerospike on AWS, visit the AWS
Marketplace »

AWS Architecture Center

The AWS Architecture Center is designed to provide you with the necessary guidance and application
architecture best practices to build highly scalable and reliable applications in the AWS Cloud. These resources
will help you understand the AWS platform, its services and features, and will provide architectural guidance
for design and implementation of systems that run on the AWS infrastructure.

4:59
Latest from the video series: This
Is My Architecture

In this episode of This Is My

Architecture, Lisa Moreno from New
Relic explains how they take a
modular approach to automated AWS
infrastructure deployment using
HashiCorp's Terraform.

This video is part of the This Is My

Architecture (TMA) series for
technical audiences. This series
showcases innovative architectural
solutions designed by AWS
customers and partners. Be sure to
check out the other videos in the
series.

AWS Quick Start Reference Deployments

AWS Quick Start reference deployments help you rapidly deploy fully functional software on the AWS Cloud,
following AWS best practices for security and availability. An AWS CloudFormation template automates the
deployment, and a deployment guide describes the architecture and implementation in detail. Quick Starts are
modular and customizable; you can layer additional functionality on top or modify them for your own
implementations. Use Quick Starts to deploy the following solutions on AWS:

Lync Server 2013

Build a small or medium-sized Microsoft Lync Server 2013 environment on AWS with high availability and
disaster recovery. The guide also provides guidance for larger deployments. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Exchange Server 2013

Deploy Microsoft Exchange Server 2013 with Active Directory Domain Services in a highly available
architecture on AWS, choosing a new or  existing VPC. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Windows PowerShell DSC

Build a Microsoft Windows PowerShell DSC pull or push server environment on AWS, using Active Directory
and Remote Desktop Gateway. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

SharePoint Server 2016

Deploy Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016 on AWS, using SQL Server AlwaysOn Availability Groups with
WSFC as the database tier. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Remote Desktop Gateway

Build a secure remote administration solution on AWS, using RD Gateway and RDP to access Windows-based
instances. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Active Directory Domain Services

Deploy Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) and Domain Name Server (DNS) on AWS, and choose
from three deployment scenarios. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

SQL Server with WSFC

Implement a HA solution with Windows Server Failover Clustering (WSFC) and SQL Server AlwaysOn
Availability Groups. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Web Application Proxy and AD FS

Deploy Web Application Proxy and Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) into a new or existing VPC,
following AWS best practices. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

SAP HANA
Build a multi-node SAP HANA cluster on AWS. You can use SLES or RHEL, and build the infrastructure from
scratch or deploy SAP HANA into an existing VPC. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

SAP Business One for SAP HANA

Deploy SAP Business One, version for SAP HANA, into a new or existing VPC in the AWS Cloud, following
AWS best practices. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Cloudera EDH
Build a multi-node Cloudera Enterprise Data Hub (EDH) cluster by integrating Cloudera Director with AWS
services. Choose a new or existing AWS infrastructure. View guide: HTML | PDF

MongoDB
Deploy MongoDB on AWS in a flexible, scalable, and cost-effective way. You can choose a new or existing
AWS infrastructure for your deployment. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Deep Security
Deploy Trend Micro Deep Security in the AWS Cloud, using AWS best practices. Supports two licensing
options: BYOL and Per Protected Instance Hour. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Magento
Build an e-commerce solution rapidly with Magento in the AWS Cloud. The Quick Start automatically deploys
Magento into a new or existing AWS infrastructure. View guide: HTML | PDF

Ansible Tower
Take advantage of Ansible playbooks, centralized logging, auditing, and system tracking, and manage your EC2
instances with Ansible Tower on the AWS Cloud. More » View guide: HTML | PDF
Chef Server
Manage your dynamic cloud infrastructure or on-premises servers by deploying Chef Server on AWS. Uses the
official Chef Server AMI and supports 5-250 nodes. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

NIST
Deploy an architecture for NIST SP 800-53 and 800-171, OMB TIC - FedRAMP Overlay (pilot), and DoD
Cloud Computing SRG. This is an AWS Enterprise Accelerator - Compliance offering. More »
View guide: HTML | PDF

Puppet
Maintain consistency and reliability across your IT infrastructure with Puppet on the AWS Cloud. This Quick
Start deploys a Puppet master and creates Puppet agents in a VPC. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

PCI DSS
Deploy an architecture that helps support Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard (DSS)
compliance on the AWS Cloud. This an AWS Enterprise Accelerator - Compliance offering. More »
View guide: HTML | PDF

Microsoft servers
Deploy five Microsoft business productivity servers (Lync, SharePoint, SQL, Exchange, Web Application
Proxy with AD FS) along with AD DS to build your enterprise productivity platform on AWS. More »
View guide: HTML | PDF

NIST high-impact
Deploy an architecture for the NIST SP 800-53 high-impact control baseline, and assessment/authorization
frameworks that include the requirements from this baseline. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Docker Datacenter
Deploy this CaaS solution in a highly available AWS environment, following AWS and Docker best practices.
Includes Universal Control Plane, Docker Trusted Registry, and Docker Engine. More »
View guide: PDF

Red Hat OpenShift

Deploy Red Hat's container application platform on AWS. This PaaS solution uses Docker-formatted Linux
containers, Kubernetes orchestration, and RHEL 7 to accelerate app delivery.
View guide: PDF

Spinnaker
Deploy Spinnaker, the continuous software delivery platform from Netflix OSS, on AWS. An AWS
CloudFormation template builds the AWS infrastructure and deploys Spinnaker in an Amazon VPC.
View guide: PDF

NGINX Plus
Deploy NGINX Plus, an application delivery platform from NGINX, Inc., on AWS. An AWS CloudFormation
template builds the AWS infrastructure and deploys NGINX Plus in an Amazon VPC. More »
View guide: PDF

Amazon VPC
Deploy a modular, scalable virtual network architecture with Amazon VPC, according to AWS best practices.
You can use this deployment as a foundation for your AWS infrastructure. More »
View guide: HTML | PDF

Linux bastion hosts

Deploy Linux bastion hosts to gain secure remote access to your Linux instances in a new or existing VPC
environment. You can use this deployment as a building block for your Linux deployments on AWS. More »
View guide: HTML | PDF

Oracle Database
Deploy Oracle Database 12c Enterprise Edition with Oracle Data Guard and Oracle ASM on the AWS Cloud in
a highly available, scalable environment. The automatic deployment takes about one hour. More »
View guide: HTML| PDF

Bitbucket Data Center

Deploy Bitbucket Data Center, a source code management tool from Atlassian, on the AWS Cloud in a highly
available, scalable environment. The automatic deployment takes less than 30 minutes. More »
View guide: PDF

JIRA
Deploy JIRA Software Data Center and JIRA Service Desk Data Center from Atlassian on AWS in less than 30
minutes. These solutions provide high availability, scalability, and performance. More »
View guide: PDF

Swift web apps

Build a development environment for the Swift programming language, using Vapor as the web framework and
Amazon ECS to create a scalable application stack on AWS. More » View guide: PDF

CI/CD Pipeline
Deploy a continuous integration / continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline on AWS with MSBuild, IIS, Windows
PowerShell, and .NET in combination with Jenkins, AWS CodePipeline, and AWS CodeDeploy. More »
View guide: PDF

HashiCorp Consul
Deploy HashiCorp Consul on AWS in less than 10 minutes. This DevOps tool provides service discovery and
configuration; health checking, a key/value store, and multiple datacenter support. More »
View guide: PDF

HashiCorp Vault
Deploy HashiCorp Vault on AWS in less than 10 minutes. This tool secures, stores, and controls access to
secrets across distributed infrastructure and applications from a central location. More »
View guide: PDF

Informatica Big Data Management

Deploy Big Data Management, which provides data integration and transformation services for large datasets,
from AWS technology partner Informatica. More » View guide: PDF

Informatica PowerCenter
Deploy PowerCenter, which integrates data from a vast array of data sources, including AWS services, from
AWS technology partner Informatica. More » View guide: PDF
UK-OFFICIAL
Deploy a standardized environment for workloads classified as United Kingdom (UK) OFFICIAL, aligned with
NCSC principles and CIS controls. More » View guide: HTML | PDF

Alfresco One
Deploy an optimized AWS architecture with Alfresco One as your Enterprise Content Management (ECM)
solution, and customize it for your specific scenario. More » View guide: PDF

Symantec Protection Engine

Incorporate malware and threat detection technologies into your application with Symantec's security
technology on AWS. More » View guide: PDF

AWS Reference Architectures

The flexibility of AWS allows you to design your application architectures the way you like. AWS Reference
Architecture Datasheets provide you with the architectural guidance you need in order to build an application
that takes full advantage of the AWS cloud infrastructure. Each datasheet includes a visual representation of the
application architecture and basic description of how each service is used.

Web Application Hosting

Build highly-scalable and reliable web or mobile-web applications (PDF)

Content and Media Serving

Build highly reliable systems that serve massive amounts of content and media (PDF)

Batch Processing
Build auto-scalable batch processing systems like video processing pipelines (PDF)

Fault tolerance and High Availability

Build systems that quickly failover to new instances in an event of failure (PDF)

Large Scale Processing and Huge Data sets

Build high-performance computing systems that involve Big Data (PDF)

Ad Serving
Build highly-scalable online ad serving solutions (PDF)

Disaster Recovery for Local Applications

Build cost-effective Disaster Recovery solutions for on-premises applications (PDF)

File Synchronization
Build simple file synchronization service (PDF)

Media Sharing
Cloud-powered Media Sharing Framework (PDF)

Online Games
Build powerful online games (PDF)
 Log Analysis
Analyze massive volumes of log data in the cloud (PDF)

Financial Services Grid Computing

Build highly scalable and elastic grids for the Financial Services Sector (PDF)

E- Commerce Website Part 1: Web Frontend

Build elastic Web Front-ends for an e-Commerce website (PDF)

E-Commerce Website Part 2: Checkout Pipeline

Build highly scalable checkout pipeline for an e-Commerce website (PDF)

E-Commerce Website Part 3: Marketing and Recommendations

Build highly scalable recommendation engine for an e-Commerce website (PDF)

Time Series Processing

Build elastic systems that process time series data (PDF)

Architecture Whitepapers from AWS

AWS Well-Architected Framework
This paper describes the AWS Well-Architected Framework, which enables customers to assess and improve
their cloud-based architectures and better understand the business impact of their design decisions. We address
general design principles as well as specific best practices and guidance in four conceptual areas that we define
as the pillars of the Well-Architected Framework. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

AWS Cloud Architecture Best Practices Whitepaper

The cloud reinforces some old concepts of building highly scalable Internet architectures and introduces some
new concepts that entirely change the way applications are built and deployed. To leverage the full benefit of
the Cloud, including its elasticity and scalability, it is important to understand AWS services, features, and best
practices. This whitepaper provides a technical overview of all AWS services and highlights various application
architecture best practices to help you design efficient, scalable cloud architectures. Download Whitepaper
(PDF).

Building Fault-Tolerant Applications on AWS Whitepaper

AWS provides you with the necessary tools, features and geographic regions that enable you to build reliable,
affordable fault-tolerant systems that operate with a minimal amount of human interaction. This whitepaper
discusses all the fault-tolerant features that you can use to build highly reliable and highly available applications
in the AWS Cloud. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

Using AWS for Disaster Recovery Whitepaper

In the event of a disaster, you can quickly launch resources in Amazon Web Services (AWS) to ensure business
continuity. The paper highlights relevant AWS features and services that you can leverage for your DR
processes and shows example scenarios on how to recover from a disaster. It further provides recommendations
on how you can improve your DR plan and leverage the full potential of AWS for your Disaster Recovery
processes. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

Operational Checklists for AWS

Deploying an application on Amazon Web Services (AWS) is fast, easy, and cost-effective. This paper is
targeted at developers and architects who are looking for operational and application architecture guidance from
AWS to help assess their application’s operational readiness. It provides two checklists - Basic and Enterprise -
so that you can evaluate your applications against a list of essential and recommended best practices and then
deploy them with confidence. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

Web Hosting Best Practices Whitepaper

Hosting highly-available and scalable web applications can be a complex and expensive proposition. Traditional
scalable web architectures have not only needed to implement complex solutions to ensure high levels of
reliability, but have also required an accurate forecast of traffic to provide a high level of customer service.
AWS provides the reliable, scalable, secure, and highly performing infrastructure required for the most
demanding web applications – while enabling an elastic, scale-out and scale-down infrastructure model to
match IT costs with real-time customer traffic patterns. This whitepaper will review Web application hosting
solution in detail, including how each of the services can be used to create a highly available, scalable Web
application. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

Leveraging Different Storage Options in the AWS Cloud Whitepaper

The AWS Cloud platform includes a variety of cloud-based data storage options. While these alternatives allow
architects and developers to make design choices that best meet their application’s needs, the number of choices
can sometimes cause confusion. In this whitepaper, we provide an overview of each storage option, describe
ideal usage scenarios, and examine other important storage-specific characteristics (such as elasticity and cost)
so that you can decide which storage option to use when. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

AWS Security Best Practices Whitepaper

Security should be implemented in every layer of your cloud application architecture. In this whitepaper, you
will learn about some specific tools, features and guidelines on how to secure your Cloud application in the
AWS environment. We will suggest strategies how security can be built into the application from the ground
up. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

Amazon Simple Email Service Best Practices Whitepaper

To run a successful email program, you must be aware of a few topics that can affect your delivery and
ultimately your impact on email recipients. You might send email for a variety of reasons, including enhancing
an existing relationship with a customer, marketing new products and offers, educating a group of people
sharing a common interest, or notifying customers of an event. In this whitepaper, we start by discussing the
value attributed to your email by your recipients and the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) responsible for
protecting their inboxes. Then we explain what the emailing process looks like, who’s involved, and what their
roles are. Finally, you’ll learn how to optimize value and drive it up based on some best practices we’ve
compiled. Download Whitepaper (PDF).

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