The AWS Platform consists of a huge amount of services to cover nearly all IT relevant use cases. Services can be covered in the following categories:
For a better idea of the AWS ecosystem I’ll show you the most useful services for each category in a high-level overview. Before we start it’s important to know the difference between three basic definitions of the global AWS Infrastructure.
Region: A Region is a physical location in the world which consists of two or more Availability Zones (AZ’s)
Availability Zone: An Availability Zone (AZ) is a Data Center, each with redundant power, networking and connectivity, housed in separate facilities.
Edge Location: Edge Locations are endpoints for AWS which are used for caching content. There are many more Edge locations then regions (currently 96 – 1.1.2018). This consists typically of Cloudfront, Amazons Content Delivery Network.
Let’s now have a look on these huge amounts of cool and useful services AWS has to offer.
EC2 – Elastic Cloud, Amazons Cloud Computing Service
EC2 Container Service – Run and Manage Docker Containers
Elastic Beanstalk – Run and manage web apps, useful for Devs who don’t understand AWS and just want to upload and run their code
Lambda – Serverless computing, run your code in response to events.
Lightsail – Launch and manage virtual private servers, an easy version of the EC2
Batch – Run Batch jobs at any scale
S3 – Scalable storage in the cloud
EFS – Elastic File System, managed file storage for EC2. Works basically like a NAS and can be mounted to multiple virtual machines.
Glacier – Archive Storage in the cloud
Snowball – A physical way to bring large amount of data in the cloud
Storage Gateway – Hybrid storage integration, virtual appliances which replicate data into your S3 Buckets
Aurora – AWS managed relational database compatible with MySQL and PostgreSQL
RDS – Managed relational database service for MYSQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, SQL Server and MariaDB
DynamoDB – Managed NoSQL, non-relational Databases
Elasticache – In-memory caching systems, frees up your database services
Red Shift – Data warehousing and Business Intelligence
Neptune – Managed graph database service
AWS Database Migration Service – Database Migration Tool
AWS Migration Hub – Tracking Service which track your applications as you migrate them into AWS, integrates with other migration services and visualize migrations.
Application Discovery Service – Discover and tracks dependencies of on- premise applications inside your AWS
Database migration service – easy way to migrate on- premise databases into AWS
Server migration service – migrate on- premise servers to AWS
Snowball – same as covert under “Storage”, physical way to bring large amount of data in the cloud
VPC – “Virtual Private Cloud”, basically a virtual datacenter where you configure things like firewalls, Availability Zones, Network CIDR Address Ranges, Network ACLs, Route Tables, etc.
CloudFront – Global Content Delivery Network
Route 53 – Scalable Domain Name System
API Gateway – Build, deploy and manage your own APIs
DirectConnect – Dedicated network connections to AWS
CodeStar – Project managing your code, collaborating with other developers
CodeCommit – Source Control Service, place to store your code
CodeBuild – Build and test code
CodeDeploy – Automate code deployment to your EC2 instances
CodePipeline – release software using continues delivery
X-Ray – Analyze and debug your applications
Cloud9 – Write, run and debug your code on a cloud IDE in your browser.
CloudWatch – Monitor resources and applications
CloudFormation – Create and manage AWS resources with scripting templates
CloudTrail – Track user activity and API usage
Config – Track resource inventory and changes and manage infrastructure snapshots
OpsWork – Automate operations with Chef and Puppet
Service Catalog – Create and use standardized products used typically for governance and compliance requirements
Systems Manager – Interface to manage your AWS resources and gain operational insights
Trusted Advisor – Optimize performance and security
Elastic Transcoder – Scalable Media Transcoding
Media Convert – File based video transcoding service
Media Live – live video broadcasting service
Media Package – Video origination and packaging
Media Store – Storage service optimized for media
Media Tailor – Video personalization and monetization (e.g. target based advertising)
Sage Maker – Build, train and deploy machine learning models at scale
Comprehend – Discover insights and relationships in text
DeepLens – Deep learning enabled video camera
Lex – Voice and text chatbot service
Polly – turn text into speech (the speech is actually pretty cool, not the typical ’98 robot voice)
Machine Learning – Machine learning for developers
Recognition – Analyze image and video
Translate – Amazons machine translation service
Transcribe – Automatic speech recognition
Athena – Query Data in S3 buckets using SQL (serverless)
EMR – Hosted Hadoop framework, used for processing huge amount of data
Cloud Search – Managed search service
Elastisearch Service – Run and scale Elastisearch search engine clusters
Kinesis – collect and process large streams of data records in real time
Quick Sight – Business analytic service
Data Pipeline – Orchestration service for periodic, data- driven workflows
Glue – Amazons ETL service (Extract, Transform, Load) to prepare and load data
IAM – Identity & Access Management, manage user access and encryption keys
Cognito – Identity management for your apps
Guard Duty – Managed threat detection service
Inspector – Analyze application security (runs as agent on your virtual instances)
Macie – Discover classify and protect data inside your S3 buckets
Certificate Manager – Provision, manage and deploy SSL/ TLS Certificates (You can get free SSL Certificates if you use the AWS Certificate Manager with Route53)
CloudHSM – Hardware- based key storage for regulatory compliance
Directory Service – Manage Microsoft Active Directory
WAF – Web Application Firewall, basically a layer 7 firewall to filter malicious web traffic
Shield – DDoS Protection Service
Artifact – Audit and compliance portal for on- demand access to download AWS compliance reports and manage select agreements
Organizations – Policy-based management for multiple AWS accounts
Mobile Hub – Management console to build, test and monitor apps
API Gateway – Build, deploy and manage APIs
Pinpoint – Push notifications for mobile apps
AppSync – Real- time and offline data sync for mobile data apps
Device Farm – Test Android, FireOS and iOS apps on real devices in the cloud
Mobile SDK – Mobile Software Development Kit
Sumerian – Build and run VR and AR applications
Step Functions – Coordinate the components of distributed applications (e.g. Lambda functions) as a series of steps in a visual workflow.
Simple Queue Service (SQS) – Hosted message queues, for storing messages as they travel between applications or microservices
Simple Notification Service (SNS) – Notification service for mobile push and SMS
MQ – Managed message broker for ActiveMQ
Connect – Contact center as a service
Simple Email Service (SES) – Email sending and receiving
Alexa for Business – Alexa for organizations
Chime – AWS conference, meeting and chat tool.
Work Docs – Enterprise storage and sharing service for documents
Work Mail – Secure and managed business email and calendaring
Work Spaces – AWS’ VDI solution
AppStream 2.0 – Application streaming, equal to citrix
IoT Core – management service to connect devices to the cloud
Free RTOS – IoT operating system for microcontrollers
Greengrass – Local compute, messaging and sync for devices
IoT Analytics – IoT device analytics
IoT Device Defender – Security management for IoT devices
IoT Device Management – Onboard, organize and remotely manage IoT devices
GameLift – Game server hosting
Lumberyard – Cross- platform 3D game engine with full source, integrated with AWS and Twitch
As you can see, there is literally a service for everything. Why don’t you try the console with a 12-month free trial account and get a better understanding of the AWS ecosystem.
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