AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – ProfessionalResilient Cloud SolutionsHard

A global software-as-a-service (SaaS) company needs to ensure its application is highly available and fault-tolerant across multiple AWS regions. The application consists of stateless web servers and a stateful database. The company requires an architecture that can automatically route users to the nearest healthy region and perform automated failover in case of a regional outage. Which combination of AWS services should be used to meet these requirements?

  1. AAmazon Route 53 with simple routing policy and EC2 instances with Auto Scaling groups in each region.
  2. BAmazon Route 53 with failover routing policy, health checks, and Aurora Global Database.
  3. CAmazon Route 53 with latency-based routing, health checks, and Amazon RDS Multi-AZ in each region.
  4. DAWS Global Accelerator with endpoint groups in each region and Amazon DynamoDB Global Tables.
Show answer & explanation

Correct answer: B. Amazon Route 53 with failover routing policy, health checks, and Aurora Global Database.

Route 53's failover routing with health checks can detect regional failures and automatically direct traffic to a healthy secondary region. Aurora Global Database provides fast, cross-region replication and RTO/RPO in minutes for the stateful database layer, enabling quick recovery from a regional disaster.

Why the other options are wrong

  • A. Simple routing does not provide health checks or automatic failover. EC2 Auto Scaling is for regional availability, not cross-regional DR.
  • C. Latency-based routing directs users to the lowest latency region but does not automatically failover if that region becomes unhealthy. RDS Multi-AZ provides high availability within a single region, not cross-regional disaster recovery with low RPO/RTO.
  • D. AWS Global Accelerator can route traffic to the nearest healthy endpoint, but DynamoDB Global Tables, while multi-region, are eventually consistent by default for cross-region replication. For a 'stateful database' in a 'SaaS company' requiring high availability and fault tolerance, a relational database with strong consistency like Aurora Global Database is often preferred unless explicitly stated otherwise.

Route 53 Failover Routing with Aurora Global Database

This combination provides a robust multi-region disaster recovery solution where Route 53 automatically routes traffic to a healthy region based on health checks, and Aurora Global Database ensures low RPO/RTO for the relational database.

  • Route 53 health checks monitor primary region health.
  • Failover routing policy automatically switches DNS to secondary region.
  • Aurora Global Database replicates data across regions with minimal lag.
  • Secondary Aurora region can be promoted to primary for quick recovery.

Memory trick: Route 53 guides, Aurora Global saves the day.

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