AWS_Services
Aurora
+2
Oct 19, 2026
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11 min read
SL#131 - AWS Services (21/120) - Amazon Aurora: The Shared Storage Volume That Makes It Not Just RDS, and a Failover You Measure to the Second
Aurora keeps the database engine you know and replaces the storage underneath it. We build a Serverless v2 PostgreSQL cluster with a writer and a reader, point a connection prober at it, force a failover, and read the outage off the clock. Plan 60 to 90 minutes and a small bill.
RDS
+2
Oct 18, 2026
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10 min read
SL#129 - AWS Services (20/120) - Amazon RDS: What Managed Actually Manages, a Failover You Trigger on Purpose, and the Downtime You Can Measure
RDS runs the database engine you already know and takes over everything underneath it. We build a Multi-AZ PostgreSQL instance, hammer it with a connection prober, force a failover, and read the outage off the clock. Plan 60 to 90 minutes and a small bill.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 17, 2026
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11 min read
SL#128 - AWS Services (19/120) - Amazon DynamoDB: Single-Table Design, the Hot Partition You Will Create, and a Table You Can Break on Purpose
DynamoDB is a key-value store that punishes you for modeling it like a database. We build an orders table with a GSI, a transaction, and a deliberate hot key, then read the throttling like a postmortem. Plan 60 to 90 minutes and well under a dollar.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 16, 2026
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10 min read
SL#127 - AWS Services (18/120) - AWS Backup: The Restore You Never Tested, a Locked Vault, and the Drill That Proves It
We will put a DynamoDB table under a tag-driven backup plan, lock the vault so nobody can delete the backups, restore into a fresh table, and compare the data. Plan for 45 to 60 minutes and well under a dollar.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 12, 2026
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8 min read
SL#123 - AWS Services (16/120) - Amazon FSx: Four File Systems Under One Name, and the OpenZFS One You Can Mount in Ten Minutes
Amazon FSx is four managed file systems (Windows, Lustre, ONTAP, OpenZFS) under one name. How to pick one, what each costs and limits, and a build that mounts and snapshots an OpenZFS share.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 11, 2026
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11 min read
SL#122 - AWS Services (15/120) - Amazon EFS: POSIX at Network Latency, and the Throughput Mode That Decides Your Bill
Amazon EFS is an NFS file system you never size, patch or run out of. This is the definition-first reference: the model, the limits, the cost dimensions, and a build where two Lambda functions share one directory.
EBS
+2
Oct 10, 2026
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9 min read
SL#118 - AWS Services (14/120) - Amazon EBS: gp3 vs io2 vs st1, the IOPS and Throughput Contract, and a Volume Swap You Can Measure
A definition-first reference to Amazon EBS, plus a runnable boto3 build: a gp3 volume, a fio baseline, a live Elastic Volumes change of IOPS and throughput, and a second measurement that shows what you bought.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 9, 2026
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9 min read
SL#117 - AWS Services (13/120) - Amazon S3 Tables: Managed Iceberg as a Bucket Type, and the Maintenance Knobs You Should Set on Day One
A definition-first reference to S3 table buckets, plus a runnable boto3 build: a table bucket, a namespace, an Iceberg table, deliberately small writes from Athena, and a maintenance configuration you can inspect. Plan for about 45 minutes.
S3
+2
Oct 7, 2026
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9 min read
SL#114 - AWS Services (11/120) - Amazon S3: Strong Consistency, Eleven Nines, and the Request Bill Nobody Models
The definition, the cost model, the limits, and a versioned bucket with lifecycle that you build and cost out to the cent.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 5, 2026
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11 min read
SL#112 - AWS Services (9/120) - AWS Elastic Beanstalk: The Original PaaS in 2026, What It Still Does Well, and the Honest Way Out
Elastic Beanstalk is a deployment engine that wraps EC2, an Auto Scaling group and a load balancer in one object. This reference covers the model, the limits, and a runnable build with a rolling deploy and a blue/green swap.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 4, 2026
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11 min read
SL#111 - AWS Services (8/120) - Amazon Lightsail: The Fixed-Price On-Ramp, and the Day You Migrate Out
When Lightsail is the right answer, when it is a trap you will migrate out of, and a script that builds a server, measures its CPU budget, and proves you can leave.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 3, 2026
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10 min read
SL#109 - AWS Services (7/120) - AWS App Runner: Closed to New Customers, and the ECS Express Mode Migration
App Runner no longer accepts new customers. What it was, what replaced it, what the bill looks like, and a working migration to ECS Express Mode you can run for about a dime.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 2, 2026
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9 min read
SL#108 - AWS Services (6/120) - AWS Batch: Queues, Compute Environments, and the Array Job That Does the Fan-Out
AWS Batch is a job queue bolted to a capacity manager. The definition, the cost model, the limits, and a 20-way array job on Fargate that costs about a cent.
Tutorial
+2
Oct 1, 2026
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11 min read
SL#107 - AWS Services (5/120) - AWS Fargate: Serverless Containers and the Per-Task Pricing Math
Fargate is not a cheaper or simpler EC2. It is a different billing unit, one task at a time. This article gives you the model, the real prices, and a script that runs the same container on x86, ARM and Spot and tells you what each run cost.
Tutorial
+2
Sep 30, 2026
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11 min read
SL#106 - AWS Services (4/120) - Amazon EKS: Managed Kubernetes and the Data Plane It Doesn't Manage
EKS sells you a managed control plane for $0.10/hr. What 'managed' excludes - the data plane - is the story. We build an Auto Mode cluster, wire a workload with Pod Identity, and cost every piece.
ECS
+2
Jul 23, 2026
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10 min read
SL#105 - AWS Services (3/120) - Amazon ECS: Cluster, Task, Service, and the Rolling Deploy Underneath
Three nouns everyone confuses, one deploy model that quietly changed in 2025, and a containerized API you ship to ECS on Fargate in an afternoon. Plan for 45 minutes and about ten cents of spend.
Tutorial
+2
Jul 22, 2026
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10 min read
SL#104 - AWS Services (2/120) - AWS Lambda: The Cold Start Is the Model, Not the Bug
What Lambda actually is, how the execution and concurrency model works, what it costs, the limits that bite at scale, and a hands-on build that provisions concurrency and measures the cold-start latency it removes. Plan for 60-90 minutes.
EC2
+2
Jul 21, 2026
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10 min read
SL#101 - AWS Services (1/120) - Amazon EC2: The Primitive Every Other AWS Service Is Built On
The definition-first reference for EC2: the instance model, the six ways to pay for it, the quotas that bite, and a hands-on build of a right-sized instance behind an Auto Scaling group with a warm pool. Plan for about 45 minutes and under a dollar.