Ace Your SAA-C03 AWS Certified Associate Exam

To provide the HPC cluster with consistent sub-millisecond latency and high-throughput access to the data on the Snowball Edge Storage Optimized devices, a solutions architect should configure an Amazon FSx for Lustre file system, and integrate it with an Amazon S3 bucket. This solution has the following benefits:

It allows the HPC cluster to access the data on the Snowball Edge devices using a POSIX-compliant file system that is optimized for fast processing of large datasets1.

It enables the data to be imported from the Snowball Edge devices into the S3 bucket using the AWS Snow Family Console or the AWS CLI2. The data can then be accessed from the FSx for Lustre file system using the S3 integration feature3.

It supports high availability and durability of the data, as the FSx for Lustre file system can automatically copy the data to and from the S3 bucket3. The data can also be accessed from other AWS services or applications using the S3 API4.

The solution that meets the requirements with the most operational efficiency is to configure public subnets in the existing VPC and deploy an MSK cluster in the public subnets. This solution allows the data ingestion solution to be publicly available over the internet without creating a new VPC or deploying a load balancer. The solution also ensures that the data intransit is encrypted by enabling mutual TLS authentication, which requires both the client and the server to present certificates for verification. This solution leverages the public access feature of Amazon MSK, which is available for clusters running Apache Kafka 2.6.0 or later versions1.

The other solutions are not as efficient as the first one because they either create unnecessary resources or do not encrypt the data in transit. Creating a new VPC with public subnets would incur additional costs and complexity for managing network resources and routing. Deploying an ALB or an NLB would also add more costs and latency for the data ingestion solution. Moreover, an ALB or an NLB would not encrypt thedata in transit by itself, unless they are configured with HTTPS listeners and certificates, which would require additional steps and maintenance. Therefore, these solutions are not optimal for the given requirements.

This solution meets the requirements because it uses the following components and features:

AdministratorAccess identity-based policy: This is an AWS managed policy that provides full access to AWSservices and resources1. By attaching this policy to the IAM user group, the solutions architect can grant the permissions needed for the designated employees to perform any task in the AWS account.

IAM user group: This is a collection of IAM users that share common permissions2. By creating a user group and adding the five designated employees as members, the solutions architect can simplify the management of permissions and reduce the risk of human errors or inconsistencies.

IAM users: These are identities that represent the designated employees in AWS2. By creating an IAM user for each employee and requiring them to sign in with their own credentials, the solutions architect can enhance the security and accountability of the AWS account.

This option is the most cost-effective and simple way to enable SFTP access to the S3 data lake. AWS Transfer Family is a fully managed service that supports secure file transfers over SFTP, FTPS, and FTPprotocols. You can create an SFTP-enabled server with a public endpoint and associate it with your S3 bucket. You can also use AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) roles and policies to control access to your S3 data lake. The service scales automatically to handle any volume of file transfers and provides high availability and durability. You do not need to provision, manage, or patch any servers or load balancers.

Option B is not correct because Amazon S3 File Gateway is not an SFTP server. It is a hybrid cloud storage service that provides a local file system interface to S3. You can use it to store and retrieve files as objects in S3 using standard file protocols such as NFS and SMB. However, itdoes not support SFTP protocol, and it requires deploying a file gateway appliance on-premises or on EC2.

Option C is not cost-effective or scalable because it requires launching and managing an EC2 instance in a private subnet and setting up a VPN connection for the new partner. This would incur additional costs for the EC2 instance, the VPN connection, and the data transfer. It would also introduce complexity and security risks to the solution. Moreover, it would require running a cron job script on the EC2 instance to upload files to the S3 data lake, which is not efficient or reliable.

Option D is not cost-effective or scalable because it requires launching and managing multiple EC2 instances in a private subnet and placing a NLB in front of them. This would incur additional costs for the EC2 instances, the NLB, and the data transfer. It would also introduce complexity and security risks to the solution. Moreover, it would require running a cron job script on the EC2 instances to upload files to the S3 data lake, which is not efficient or reliable. References:

What Is AWS Transfer Family?

What Is Amazon S3 File Gateway?

What Is Amazon EC2?

[What Is Amazon Virtual Private Cloud?]

[What Is a Network Load Balancer?]