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Difficulty: MediumIdentify design principles of the AWS Cloud

A media company is redesigning its video transcoding pipeline on AWS. Currently, a monolithic system receives uploaded videos, transcodes them, and stores the results. When multiple large files are uploaded at the same time, the system runs out of resources and fails, halting the entire pipeline. Which of the following architectural changes should the company implement to align with the AWS Cloud design principles of 'loose coupling' and 'services not servers'? (Select TWO.)

  1. Use Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) to buffer incoming transcoding requests, allowing the upload and transcoding components to operate independently.Answer
  2. Utilize AWS Lambda functions to execute the transcoding code automatically in response to upload events without provisioning or managing virtual servers.Answer
  3. C
    Host both the upload interface and the transcoding software on a single high-performance Amazon EC2 instance to ensure they share local memory space for fast data sharing.
  4. D
    Design the upload component to make direct synchronous API calls to the transcoding servers to ensure real-time status updates are maintained.
  5. E
    Pre-provision a static fleet of Amazon EC2 instances based on peak video upload volume to ensure there is always sufficient CPU capacity.

Answer

The correct architecture uses Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) to decouple the upload and transcoding components, and AWS Lambda to process transcoding tasks without managing underlying servers.
The correct selections are using Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS) to buffer incoming transcoding requests and utilizing AWS Lambda to execute transcoding code. Amazon SQS decouples the upload and transcoding components so they do not depend on each other's immediate availability (implementing loose coupling). AWS Lambda runs code serverlessly in response to upload events, which removes the operational burden of managing, patching, and scaling physical or virtual servers (implementing services not servers).

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Analyze the problem in the scenario: a monolithic transcoding system runs out of resources and fails when handling simultaneous uploads, causing the entire pipeline to fail.
Identified the need for decoupled, resilient components (loose coupling) and serverless computing to avoid managing virtual servers (services not servers).
This establishes which design principles are needed to solve the problem.
2
Evaluate the option regarding Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS).
Amazon SQS acts as a message broker that decouples components, allowing them to scale independently and preventing failures in one component from taking down the other.
This implements the 'loose coupling' design principle.
3
Evaluate the option regarding AWS Lambda.
AWS Lambda is a serverless compute service that runs code in response to events (like file uploads) without requiring EC2 instance provisioning or management.
This implements the 'services not servers' design principle.
4
Verify that other options represent design anti-patterns (such as tight coupling, monolithic setups, or static provisioning).
The option suggesting a single EC2 instance and the option suggesting synchronous API calls represent tight coupling/monolithic designs, while the option suggesting pre-provisioning a static fleet ignores elasticity.
This confirms that the distractors are incorrect based on the design principles.

Key Concept

AWS Cloud Design Principles: Loose Coupling and Services Not Servers
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Identify design principles of the AWS Cloud

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