AWS Import/Export file limits

AWS import/Export can handle volumes of larger then 1TB to be stored on Amazon EBS volumes. However, there is a intermediate step using S3.  If your storage device’s capacity is less than or equal to the maximum Amazon EBS volume size of 1TB, its contents will be loaded directly into an Amazon EBS snapshot. So, in theory no size limit. AWS does not mount the file system on your storage device, nor is a file system required to be present. AWS Import/Export performs a block for block copy from your device to an Amazon EBS Snapshot. If your storage device’s capacity exceeds 1TB, a device image will be stored within your specified Amazon S3 log bucket. You can then create a RAID of EBS volumes using software such as Logical Volume Manager, and copy the image from Amazon S3 to this new volume

IAM users and billing information

    By default, IAM users do not have access to the Account Activity or Usage Reports pages. However, as account owner you can grant IAM users permission to see either or both. You can then activate access to the billing pages, and those IAM users will have access to the billing pages according to the permissions you grant. (You can deny them access to some billing information.) http://docs.aws.amazon.com/awsaccountbilling/latest/about/ControllingAccessWebsite.html

AWS SNS, SMS and mobile push

Three methods to send messages to mobile devices:

1. SNS mobile push : http://docs.aws.amazon.com/sns/latest/dg/mobile-push-send-directmobile.html 

2. SNS mobile push with topics: http://docs.aws.amazon.com/sns/latest/dg/mobile-push-send-topicmobile.html

3. SNS with SMS: http://docs.aws.amazon.com/sns/latest/dg/SMSMessages.html

More details here on all three methods to send messages to phones using SNS here: http://docs.aws.amazon.com/sns/latest/dg/SNSMobilePush.html

 Here are some things to be aware of:

·         AWS Region: Mobile push to Android, iOS and Kindle Fire devices works in all public AWS regions, but SMS is only available in US-East

·         Recipient location: Mobile push recipients can be anywhere in the world so long as they have IP connectivity.  But SNS currently only supports US numbers.

·         Topic versus Direct mobile push: Mobile push notifications can be directly addressed to a single endpoint, but SMS currently must be delivered through a topic.

Oracle Virtualization on AWS

Oracle has a number of different virtualization offerings: Oracle VM, Oracle VM VirtualBox, and Oracle Solaris Zones being the most prominent. 

Oracle VM can be run on AWS, however, Oracle VM is a "bare-metal" / "type 1" hypervisor so it my does not run on top of an operating system or the Amazon Xen hypervisor.  There are a number of Oracle VM Templates that can be used to deploy an Oracle technical or application stack in minutes. These templates can only be used to deploy to Oracle VM.

The Oracle VM VirutalBox is a type 2 or "hosted" hypervisor which means that it runs on a host operating system.  Therefore, VBox templates can be run on Amazon Xen Linux or Windows instances. 

Oracle Solaris is not supported on AWS so Oracle Solaris Zones (builtin OS virtualization) does not apply.

AWS Elastic Beanstalk and NAT instance

An Elastic BeanStalk launched in a VPC with a private subnet requires a NAT. Each instance needs to be able to talk to the Internet in order to answer the waitcondition. Connectivity can be provide through a NAT instance but there does have to be access to the internet.

The following show a VPC configuration with a private VPC. It is the connectivity to the Elastic Beanstalk end point that is needed. As you can see it is outside the VPC.

http://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticbeanstalk/latest/dg/AWSHowTo-vpc-basic.html

You can find more detailed instructions for creating and configuring a NAT instance here:

 http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonVPC/latest/UserGuide/VPC_NAT_Instance.html

AWS PIOPS SSD backed

The question of what the technology backing EBS Provisioned IOPS volumes comes up often.  PIOPS volumes are backed by Solid-State Drives (SSDs), Provisioned IOPS volumes support up to 30 IOPS per GB which enables you to provision 4000 IOPS on a volume as small as 134 GB. 

More details here:
https://aws.amazon.com/ebs/details/

AWS high memory instance type : Good for Oracle Databases on AWS

The r3.8xlarage has 244 GiB of memory, 32 vCPUs, and 2 - 320 GB SSD drives. The cost is $2.80 per hour for on-demand instances.  More details here:

http://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2014/04/10/r3-announcing-the-next-generation-of-amazon-ec2-memory-optimized-instances/

Prior to this you had to use the i2.8xlarge instance type which also has 244 GiB of memory and 32 vCPUs. But also has 8 - 800 GB SSD drives which you will most likely not use for your Oracle Database.  The cost of i2.8xlage is $6.82 per hour for on-demand instances.  The other highest memory option is the cr1.8xlarge with 32 vCPUs and 244 GIB with 2 -120 GB SSD drives.  The cost of this option is $3.50 per hour for on-demand instances.

The R3 instances include the following features:

• Intel Xeon E5-2670 v2 "Ivy Bridge" Processors

• Hardware Virtualization (HVM) only

• SSD-backed instance storage, including TRIM support

• Enhanced Networking with lower latency, low jitter, and high packet-per-second performance

One caveat here that Oracle has not released any HVM-based instance types.  There are undocumented methods to create an HVM AMI from a PVM AMI but this new AMI may not be supported by Oracle.

Data Center Migration to AWS

Learn how RISO Inc. used Apps Associates services to move their data center to the AWS cloud. In so doing, RISO Inc. avoided capital intensive hardware purchases and redeployed IT staff to projects that directly supported their business goals. We'll also describe how you can integrate your existing environment with the cloud to create a hybrid architecture.

http://youtu.be/jE1-8vjMGrw 

http://www.slideshare.net/AmazonWebServices/aws-partner-webcast-33342744 

http://www.slideshare.net/tomlaszewski/data-center-migration-to-the-aws-cloud

AWS Boston events coming soon

Here are some event that are happening in Boston the week of April 21:

Register today for the AWS Cloud Roadshow Series for SLED.

https://ww2.eventrebels.com/er/Registration/StepRegInfo.jsp?ActivityID=10424&StepNumber=1

AWS AwSome Day Boston :  free, one-day event 

Oracle RDS GoldenGate support

Oracle GoldenGate can be used with Amazon RDS for Oracle for active-active database replication, zero-downtime migration and upgrades, disaster recovery and data protection, and cross region replication. 

More information here: http://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2014/04/03/you-can-now-use-oracle-goldengate-with-amazon-rds-for-oracle/

Oracle Spatial on Amazon EC2

This presentation has details on an Oracle Spatial implementation on AWS. http://download.oracle.com/otndocs/products/spatial/pdf/osuc2012_presentations/osuc12_gisasservice_walshbaynham.pdf

The summary is:

• Technical approach:

  ·   Oracle Database with Spatial

  ·   Deploy on Amazon EC2

  ·   J2EE Web Application Server

  ·   Multi-tenant Multi-user 100% Web software for Mapping and analyzing business data 
– eSpatial OnDemand GIS

  
  

  Amazon Overview

  ·      Elastic Cloud Computing (EC2)


  ·      Variety of Instance Types (CPU cores, memory...)

  ·      Pre-configured Amazon Machine Instances (AMI’s)

  ·      Availability Zones

  ·      Elastic Block Storage – EBS
 Simple Storage Service (S3)
 Elastic IP addresses


  ·      Load Balancing & Auto Scaling, More...

  Amazon Deployment:

  ·   Dedicated Database Server(s) with separate Web Application Servers

  ·   AMI - Oracle 11g DB & Redhat Fedora

  ·   Database on an EBS volume

  ·   ARCHIVELOG as normal – archive to a separate EBS volume

  ·   RMAN Backup to separate EBS volume

  ·   Copy backups to Amazon S3

  ·   EE & RAC or SE-1 with Standby DB

  ·   Backup from Standby DB