AWS EBS PIOPS : block size and IOPS

Having spent more time in the database world than in the web development world, I am accustomed to measuring (database) performance/through put in terms of IOPS or TPS.  The web/video/image world like to use MB/sec.  Why I am saying this? Because it relates to the conversation about getting a certain level of PIOPS (based upon a 16 KB block) on AWS EBS and how this effects MB/sec.  MB/sec, I am beginning to understand, and maybe move to the 'dark side', is the ultimate measure of disk 'performance'.  

Example: A 2000 Provisioned IOPS volume can handle:

•2000 16KB read/write per second, or 1000 32KB read/write per second, or 500 64KB read/write per second 

•You will get consistent 32 MB/sec throughput (with 16KB or higher IOs)

•Perform an index creation action and sends I/O of 32K, IOPS becomes 1000, you still get 32MB/sec throughput

•On best effort, you may get up to 40 MB/sec throughput 

So, you may be better off using a 64 KB block size but your PIOPS will show up as lower but your MB/sec could be better.

Oracle OpenWorld AWS Booth Sessions

•Amazon Web Services Booth:  South Exhibition Hall; booth 415

Monday  10:15 : AWS Overview   10:45 : Running Oracle Software on AWS

    11:15 : RDS Oracle Overview     1:15 : Oracle EM on AWS (Oracle OEM team)

  2:00 : RDS Best Practices      2:45 : Oracle Linux on AWS (Oracle Linux team)

  3:30  How are Oracle customers leveraging AWS ? (App Associates)

    4:30 : Siebel on AWS (Enterprise Beacon)

Tuesday  10:15 : Running Oracle Software on AWS  10:45 : RDS Best Practices  

    11:15 : Accenture  1:15 : Oracle Database Advanced Architectures on AWS     2:00 : CRM Cloud in a Box on AWS (Loyalty Methods) 3:30 : AWS Overview  

    4:30  : PeopleSoft on AWS (DLZP Group)

 

Wednesday  10:15 : RDS Oracle for the Enterprise   10:45 : DR on AWS  

  11:15 NetApp Private Storage for AWS   1:15 : Extending your Data Center to Cloud     2:00  : AWS Overview 2:45 : Oracle EM on AWS   3:30 : Smarter Agent’s Cloud   Forklift to AWS (SmartShift)     

Oracle on AWS webinar recordings

Here are the three Oracle on AWS recorded to date:
1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2UcCdnNsRc&feature=youtu.be - Smarter Agent, AWS and smartShift Technologies provides an overview of how they fully migrated their customer's, Smarter Agent, Oracle database to AWS to provide a scalable and cost effective hybrid implementation

2. http://youtu.be/XSBND55sghc - Listen to this webinar, presented by Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Apps Associates, an AWS Partner Network (APN) Advanced Consulting Partner, to hear how you can leverage the AWS platform to run a centralized OEM 12c environment to free up your administrative resources.

3. http://mfile.akamai.com/23543/wmv/citrixvar.download.akamai.com/23543/www/729/667/988620541967729667/2-988620541967729667-13e6bb61c33.asx

A good introduction to running Oracle databases & applications on Amazon Web Services platform.  Hear the answers to commonly asked questions like: Which Oracle products are available and possible to run on AWS?  What does support, pricing and licensing models look like? How to size Oracle on AWS?

Watch for more webinars after Oracle OpenWorld next week.

AWS @ Oracle OpenWorld 2013 details

Learn everything you need to run Oracle on AWS and talk to solution architects to address any questions you have: http://aws.amazon.com/oracle/

IDS : Host-based and network-based

Intrusion Detection Systems and Intrusion Protection Systems on AWS come up when discussion security when moving to AWS.  Here is short introduction to Oracle technologist that may not deal with IDS and IPS in their current on premise environment.

A host-based intrusion detection system (HIDS) is an intrusion detection system that monitors and analyzes the internals of a computing system, and in some cases the network packets on its network interfaces (just like an NIDS).  A host-based IDS monitors all or parts of the dynamic behavior and the state of a computer system. HIDS was first designed for the mainframe.  HIDS uses sensors (agents) located on each host.    These host-based agents, which are sometimes referred to as sensors (or agents), would typically be installed on a machine that is deemed to be susceptible to possible attacks. The term “host” refers to an individual computer/virtual host. This means that separate sensor would be needed for every machine/virtual host. Sensors/agents work by collecting data about events taking place on the system being monitored. This data is recorded by operating system in audit trails. Therefore, HIDS is very log intensive.

Network-based intrusion detection systems offer a different approach. NIDS collects information from the network itself rather than from each separate host. They operate essentially based on a “wiretapping concept" (network taps).  Information is collected from the network traffic stream, as data travels on the network.  The intrusion detection system checks for attacks or irregular behavior by inspecting the contents and header information of all the packets moving across the network. The network sensors come equipped with “attack signatures” that are rules on what will constitute an attack, and most network-based systems allow advanced users to define their own signatures.  this method is also known as packet sniffing, and allows the sensor to identify hostile traffic.

  

AWS Enable Your Consulting Business to Grow in the AWS Cloud in NYC

Great event in NYC that includes a focus on enterprise software and Oracle, SAP and Microsoft.

Amazon Web Services

Thursday, October 3, 2013 from 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM (EDT)

New York, NY

Register for the event:
http://awssipartnereventny-awsemail1.eventbrite.com

AWS EC2 instances and 32 bit

Some legacy applications including pre 11 Oracle COTS software only run on 32 bit.  Keep this in mind when moving a 32 bit based application to EC2:   These are the instance types that support 32 bit:

1. m1.small : Memory 1.7 GB CPU : 1
2. m1.medium : Memory 3.75 CPU : 2
3. c1.medium : Memory 1.7 GB CPU : 5 ECU
4. t1.micro : Memory .615 GB CPU: 1 ECU variable

 ON Windows,  WoW64 on Windows Server x64 can be used to run a 32 bit application.

Hadoop Cluster and Amazon EMR

Accenture calculated the total cost of ownership of a bare-metal Hadoop cluster and derived the capacity of nine different cloud-based Hadoop clusters at the matched TCO. The performance of each option was then compared by running three real-world Hadoop applications.  The full report is here:

http://www.accenture.com/us-en/Pages/insight-hadoop-deployment-comparison.aspx

There report compares the performance of both a bare-metal Hadoop cluster and Amazon ElasticMapReduce (Amazon EMR).