Main Topics Covered by AWS SOA-C01 Certification Exam

The structure of the AWS SOA-C01 exam is quite detailed. It handles the following seven topics:

• High availability;
• Deployment and provisioning;
• Storage and data management;
• Networking;
• Security and compliance;
• Monitoring and reporting;
• Automation and optimization.

The monitoring and reporting chapter helps candidates develop proper skills in creating and maintaining metrics and alarms by using AWS monitoring services. They will also learn how to make the difference between metrics related to availability and performance. Another major subtopic included in this section handles the necessary steps for remediation following availability and performance metrics.

The second topic deals with high availability. There, candidates will learn more about how to implement elasticity and scalability based on each use case. Besides, they will get more knowledge of how to seize the differences between resilient environments on AWS.

Within the deployment and provisioning domain, applicants will develop advanced skills in identifying and executing the necessary steps for cloud resources provisioning. They will also understand how to remediate and identify deployment issues immediately and adapt to the current business environment.

The fourth objective is dedicated to storage and data management. It is essential for candidates to understand how to create and manage data retention. Their success in the AWS SysOps Administrator – Associate certification exam will be determined by their ability to identify and implement data protection, planning needs, and encryption.

In the security and compliance part, examinees will become skilled in implementing and managing security policies related to AWS features. Also, they will understand how to implement the proper access controls that work right with AWS services and features. Finally, they will develop the right expertise on how to make the difference between different roles and responsibilities corresponding to AWS shared responsibility model.

The sixth segment talks about networking concepts. Candidates can get a passing score in his/her AWS SysOps Administrator – Associate exam if they know how to apply AWS networking features in different situations. Also, they will understand how to implement AWS connectivity services together with gathering and interpreting the necessary information to perform an efficient network troubleshooting.

The final topic of SOA-C01 handles automation and optimization. At the end of this chapter, examinees will know how to use AWS services properly and become able to assess how resources are utilized. Also, they will become proficient in employing cost-optimization strategies and automate the manual processes wherever this is needed. Thus, they will be able to minimize management overhead.

Eligibility Requirements

Since this certification relates to the middle level, the applicants need to meet several requirements concerning their working experience and knowledge of several areas. These can be summarized into the next list:

• Proper understanding of the tenets of AWS – cloud architecture, SDKs/API, and AWS CLI tools
• At least one year of core AWS experience as well as a minimum of 1-2 years of working experience in systems administrator's role
• Knowledge of network technologies, including DNS, firewalls, TCP/IP among the rest, and understanding of virtualization
• Solid skills in operating or managing AWS systems along with providing their audit and monitoring
• Appropriate understanding of the AWS security concepts alongside prior experience in executing compliance needs and security controls

How to Prepare For AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Associate

Preparation Guide for AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Associate

Introduction

AWS Certification validates cloud expertise to help professionals highlight in-demand skills and organizations build effective, innovative teams for cloud initiatives using AWS. Whether you're a cloud expert or transitioning from on-premise solutions, this certification gives you a firm base to build your cloud computing knowledge and prepare you to delve into more technical aspects of AWS.

This guide provides a detailed overview of the AWS Certified SysOps Administrator-Associate practice exams including all sorts of prerequisites for the exam, the exam format, topics covered, exam difficulty and preparation methods, and the target audience profile.

The AWS SysOps exam is part of the Amazon Administration Certification. This exam measures your ability in Administrating AWS Solution as a SysOps must do. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a subsidiary of Amazon providing on-demand cloud computing platforms and APIs to individuals, companies, and governments, on a metered pay-as-you-go basis. AWS certification is a level of Amazon Web Services cloud expertise that an IT professional obtains after passing one or more exams offered by AWS. Therefore different types of AWS Certified SysOps Administrator-Associate exam dumps are required to clear the exam.

Topics of AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Associate Exam

Candidates must know the exam topics before they start preparation. Because it will help them in hitting the core. AWS Certified SysOps Administrator-Associate exam tests will include the following topics:

Monitoring, Logging, and Remediation

• Identify, collect, analyze, and export logs (for example, Amazon CloudWatch Logs, CloudWatch Logs
• Collect metrics and logs using the CloudWatch agent
• Implement metrics, alarms, and filters by using AWS monitoring and logging services
• Create CloudWatch alarms
• Configure notifications (for example, Amazon Simple Notification Services, Service Quotas, CloudWatch alarms, AWS Health events)
• Create CloudWatch dashboards
• Create metric filters
• Insights, AWS CloudTrail logs)

Remediate issues based on monitoring and availability metrics

• Configure Amazon EventBridge rules to trigger actions
• Use AWS Systems Manager Automation documents to take action based on AWS Config rules
• Troubleshoot or take corrective actions based on notifications and alarms

Reliability and Business Continuity

• Implement scalability and elasticity
• Implement loosely coupled architectures
• Differentiate between horizontal scaling and vertical scaling
• Create and maintain AWS Auto Scaling plans
• Implement Amazon RDS replicas and Amazon Aurora Replicas
• Implement high availability and resilient environments
• Implement caching
• Differentiate between the use of a single Availability Zone and Multi-AZ deployments (for example, Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling groups, Elastic Load Balancing, Amazon FSx, Amazon RDS)
• Configure Elastic Load Balancer and Amazon Route 53 health checks
• Implement fault-tolerant workloads (for example, Amazon Elastic File System Elastic IP addresses)

Implement backup and restore strategies

• Configure Amazon S3 Cross-Region Replication
• Execute disaster recovery procedures
• Implement versioning and lifecycle rules
• Restore databases (for example, point-in-time restore, promote read replica)
• Automate snapshots and backups based on use cases (for example, RDS snapshots, AWS Backup, RTO and RPO, Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager, retention policy)

Deployment, Provisioning, and Automation

• Provision and maintain cloud resources
• Provision resources across multiple AWS Regions and accounts (for example, AWS Resource Access Manager, CloudFormation StackSets, IAM cross-account roles)
• Identify and remediate deployment issues (for example, service quotas, subnet sizing, CloudFormation, and AWS OpsWorks errors, permissions)
• Automate manual or repeatable processes
• Create and manage AMIs (for example, EC2 Image Builder)
• Select deployment scenarios and services (for example, blue/green, rolling, canary)
• Create, manage, and troubleshoot AWS CloudFormation

Security and Compliance

• Review reports or findings (for example, AWS Security Hub, Amazon GuardDuty, AWS Config, Amazon Inspector)
• Implement encryption in transit (for example, AWS Certificate Manager, VPN)
• Create, manage, and protect encryption keys
• Validate AWS Region and service selections based on compliance requirements
• Implement encryption at rest (for example, AWS Key Management Service )
• Implement secure multi-account strategies (for example, AWS Control Tower, AWS Organizations)
• Validate service control policies and permission boundaries
• Implement IAM features (for example, password policies, MFA, roles, SAML, federated identity, resource policies, policy conditions)
• Enforce a data classification scheme
• Review AWS Trusted Advisor security checks
• Securely store secrets by using AWS services (for example, AWS Secrets Manager, Systems Manager Parameter Store)
• Implement data and infrastructure protection strategies
• Troubleshoot and audit access issues by using AWS services (for example, CloudTrail, IAM Access Analyzer, IAM policy simulator)

Networking and Content Delivery

• Collect and interpret logs (for example, VPC Flow Logs, Elastic Load Balancer access logs, AWS WAF web ACL logs, CloudFront logs)
• Configure S3 static website hosting
• Configure DNS (for example, Route 53 Resolver)
• Configure a VPC (for example, subnets, route tables, network ACLs, security groups, NAT gateway, internet gateway )
• Interpret VPC configurations (for example, subnets, route tables, network ACLs, security groups)
• Configure Amazon CloudFront and S3 origin access identity (OAI)
• Identify and remediate CloudFront caching issues
• Configure Route 53 hosted zones and records
• Troubleshoot hybrid and private connectivity issues
• Configure AWS network protection services (for example, AWS WAF, AWS Shield)
• Troubleshoot network connectivity issues
• Implement networking features and connectivity
• Implement Route 53 routing policies (for example, geolocation, proximity)
• Configure domains, DNS services, and content delivery
• Configure private connectivity (for example, Systems Manager Session Manager, VPC endpoints, VPC peering, VPN)

Cost and Performance Optimization

• Monitor RDS metrics and modify the configuration to increase performance efficiency (for example, performance insights, RDS Proxy)
• Implement performance optimization strategies
• Identify opportunities to use managed services (for example, Amazon RDS, AWS Fargate, EFS)
• Monitor Amazon EBS metrics and modify the configuration to increase performance efficiency
• Assess resource usage patterns to qualify workloads for EC2 Spot Instances
• Identify and remediate underutilized or unused resources by using AWS services and tools (for example, Trusted Advisor, AWS Compute Optimizer, Cost Explorer)
• Implement cost optimization strategies
• Configure AWS Budgets and billing alarms
• Recommend computing resources based on performance metrics
• Implement cost allocation tags
• Implement S3 performance features (for example, S3 Transfer Acceleration, multipart uploads)
• Enable enhanced EC2 capabilities (for example, enhanced network adapter, instance store, placement groups)

Reference: http://awstrainingandcertification.s3.amazonaws.com/production/AWS_certified_sysops_associate_blueprint.pdf