Welcome to another episode of 'Back to Basics'.
I'm Lewis.
And today we'll discuss the patterns to run Microsoft SQL Service
for your applications on AWS.
I will show you what options you have
to run a relational database service like Microsoft SQL Service
with high availability on AWS.
Let's dive in.
Before I move Microsoft SQL Service to AWS,
I have a long history of managing relational databases
in a self-managed environment.
This is what it looks like.
I need to find a data center that has facilities such as power,
cooling, and racks to house my database.
I have to provision servers, install, operating systems
and database software, and many software patches.
There are so many moving components in this process that I'm responsible for.
When one of those components doesn't work,
it can disrupt my database services.
To ensure high availability, I need to find at least another data center
and connect two data centers together.
I spend lots of time maintaining the network service between data centers
to prevent network issues from disrupting continuous database service replication.
Many folks share the same experience.
When they move database services to AWS,
some have chosen to run database services on Amazon EC2.
With this option, you'll no longer need to manage the procurement
and life cycle of hardware facilities.
Server rack stack and maintenance will be managed by the team at AWS.
You determine the operating system, database software,
and the patching levels.
You can easily provision database services
by deploying the specified Amazon Machine Image (AMI)
onto Amazon EC2 Instances.
Because AWS manages the interconnected network services
between the Availability Zones, there are fewer moving components for you
to configure and manage database replication
to achieve service high availability.
This is a good option, if you want to reduce infrastructure-level heavy lifting,
and you want to shift relational database services quickly to AWS.
I have also seen some folks choose to move and run Microsoft SQL Service
on Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS).
With this option, you use Amazon RDS
to manage the work involved in setting up a relational database
from provisioning the infrastructure capacity
to installing OS and database software.
Once your database service is up and running,
you can select a maintenance window
to control database service modifications.
In your defined maintenance window,
Amazon RDS automates common administrative tasks
such as performing patching OS,
database software, and managing backups.
You can configure high availability of your database service
by selecting multi-Availability Zone deployment options.
Amazon RDS manages synchronous data replication
across Availability Zones with automatic failover.
This option is great because there are even fewer moving components for you to manage.
You can further reduce undifferentiated infrastructure
and system level heavy lifting.
Now, this is my preferred option
refactoring to purpose-built databases.
With refactoring to purpose-built databases option,
you can assess your Microsoft SQL Data Service compatibility,
and refactor relational data services to run with Amazon Aurora.
You'll no longer need to purchase a Microsoft SQL license
to run relational data services.
You can focus on optimizing application services
and leave data service management to Amazon Aurora
because Amazon Aurora is fully managed by Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS).
You can easily automate time-consuming administrative tasks
like hardware provisioning, database setup,
patching, and backups.
You can further improve database service resilience
and scalability by configuring Amazon Aurora
with up to 15 low latency read replicas,
point in time recovery,
continuous backup to Amazon S3,
and replication across three Availability Zones.
In this episode, we explored the patterns of running Microsoft's SQL Data Service on AWS.
We can run Microsoft SQL Service by re-hosting on Amazon EC2,
re-platforming to Amazon RDS,
or refactoring to purpose-built databases on Amazon.
The automation that these options provide,
allow you to refocus on business innovation.
Check out the links below for more details.
See your next time.