In 2018, a new job for me meant a new tech stack: AWS. Regardless of how long you’ve been developing software, new infrastructure can make you feel like you're starting from scratch. Jumping from a company with a cold room full of mainframes to somewhere cloud native was a shock, but I've enjoyed learning this wide world of cloud^h^h^h^h^hsomeone elses computer. If you feel like a cloud n00b, this post collects tips and tricks for learning cloud development from zero.
As with everything, pace yourself when trying to understand AWS and how to use it. If you feel blocked, put down one service and try another. I have found my happy path is a mixture of study, practical labs, poking around company infrastructure, and handling support rotations. Each contribute, in the long-run, to understanding the available services and building effective products upon them.
The Basics - AWS Vocabulary
The Cloud - Someone else’s computer. Keep this in mind when learning about AWS. It’s all just servers in a data center somewhere else. AWS may take care of a large or small portion of managing these computers for us, and they charge a large or small fee for the privilege.
Identity Access Management, IAM - Amazon’s method of controlling access and permissions to AWS resources. Users can have multiple IAM roles. EC2 Instances use IAM roles. Policies rely on IAM roles to allow/deny access so you only make resources available to those that need to access it.
Regions - A set of AWS data centers that are geographically related but operationally separate. Resources, accounts and VPCs can occupy a specific region.
Availability Zones - Each Region has at least three AZs. Each AZ is a data center separated from others within a specific Region. Each have independent power, cooling, and compute resources to enable you to add fault tolerance to your applications. If internet connections or power to one AZ goes down, you should be able to launch resources in the remaining AZs to compensate for the outage.
Fully Managed Service - AWS services that are fully-managed handle scaling, replication, fault-tolerance and latency without you needing to consider it. A big one is managed Elasticsearch clusters. All you need to do is specify a few parameters and AWS configures the rest (for the most part). Though you don't have to do nearly as much management, learning how to tune managed services is still up to you to solve.
EC2, Elastic Compute Cloud - Virtual machines you can launch on a whim, using the OS you desire, configuring them as you please. This is the backbone of AWS's successes. EC2 is the opposite of fully-managed services. AWS gives you the box, and you do the rest.
Learning Resources
AWS has a host of resources available to help you to learn what options are available. If you’ve never worked with a cloud provider before, I suggest taking some of their video training for Cloud Practitioner Essentials. Login with an Amazon (not AWS) account at https://www.aws.training/. Some trainings include labs that walk you through how to start your own instances, marshal AWS resources, and build a thing for yourself in the cloud. Pick something that matches your skill and engagement level, or use their workshop syllabus to self-guide training.
One of the best ways to learn cloud infrastructure is by doing. AWS offers a massive amount of services at a free-tier. Small VMs, hours of lambdas, and lots of S3 space can be used to learn a service without paying a dime to Amazon. YouTube tutorials about services often are built specifically to never breach free-tier levels of usage. Take advantage of this if getting your hands dirty helps you learn the best. Various online learning companies have video training and integrated quizzes/tests. Some have labs that rely on the free-tier of AWS so you can learn at basically no charge. If you're learning for work, talk to your manager about supporting a subscription if you have a specific avenue of study you want to go down:
If you’re a book person, AWS sponsors official study guides for each certification they offer. These can go out of date fairly quickly, but even an old version will help you get your feet wet when using a prominent service (DNS is DNS, and a Route 53 study guide will be largely applicable next year as last). Check the public library for a guides that will be applicable even if they aren't current. Find a slack channel at work or speak with experienced engineers. Context from experience can break a logjam of misunderstanding faster than reading the AWS docs for the fifth time.
Certifications
The AWS certifications are not required to work with cloud resources, but they can be a big boost to your confidence. If certifications and tests are your preferred method of study, here are a few lines that have been recommended:
AWS Cloud Practitioner Essentials - Good overview of AWS resources, administration, security, and budgeting. Take this if you’ve never used cloud resources before and want to come up to speed fast. Available as a series of videos with a free online test for certification.
AWS Solutions Architect - This is another broad level of study that can be useful after studying Practitioner. It offers a good overview of current offerings at AWS. You might use some, others not so much. Sometimes it feels like a sales pitch for their managed services, but the curriculum is useful for determining what is possible during the initial phases of a project. The multi-tiered certifications offer a learning path that can scale to your experience and career trajectory.
AWS Certified Developer - A deep dive on developing with AWS, the Developer cert study can be helpful in learning how to build on AWS as a developer. The practical labs and study areas cover some of the same problems you might have to solve every day in taking an idea from concept to supportable, sellable, product. This set of certs is also multi-tiered, and it can scale with your own experience if you feel like you need a fresh challenge.
AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Another deep-dive learning path that can help understand how to configure, secure, and economize cloud resources. Covers management and tooling available to keep a cloud running smoothly and safely without breaking the bank. Also has multiple tiers of certification.
