In this course, you'll learn about Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager and how to manage EBS snapshots within the AWS console. We're going to talk about the different types of policies you can create, automate, and monitor using Amazon DLM, along with a demo of how to get started.
Learning Objectives
- Understand the fundamentals of Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager
- Learn how to successfully set up and use Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager within your AWS account to manage new snapshots
Intended Audience
- Solutions Architects
- Cloud Engineers
- Anyone who wants to automate their EBS snapshots with the Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager
Prerequisites
To get the most out of this course, you should have prior AWS Console knowledge and have some basic experience with EBS.
Monitoring Amazon DLM through Automation. Monitoring snapshots and generating alerts on policy failures is key to having a successful snapshot or backup process. There are four methods to monitoring the lifecycle of your snapshots and AMIs. The first one is that you can manually go through the AWS console and check to make sure the lifecycle policy under the monitoring tab to ensure that they are working properly. Each snapshot and AMI created by the policy has a default tag associated with timestamp and any additional policy-related tags but this isn't really efficient.
The next method is checking AWS CloudTrail where all user activity and API usage is tracked. If you're already ingesting AWS CloudTrail alerts and performing actions based on specific events, this is where you'll find the information.
The last two methods utilize Amazon CloudWatch and Amazon CloudWatch events. The first one we're going to talk about is Amazon CloudWatch. Monitoring your Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager policies using Amazon CloudWatch, which will collect the raw data and process it into readable, near real-time metrics. Using these metrics, you'll be able to see exactly how many Amazon EB S snapshots and EBS-backed AMIs are created, deleted, and/or copied by your policies. You can set unique alerts to monitor thresholds, alert, and take action when those thresholds are reached.
The other method is CloudWatch Events. Amazon EB S and Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager generate events related to lifecycle policy actions. Additionally, you can use AWS Lambda and Amazon CloudWatch together to handle these types of events through automation. I must note that AWS does indicate that these events are emitted on a best effort basis. This concludes monitoring Amazon DLM through Automation.
Jon Myer, ex-amazonian and a Chief Evangelist at nOps. His passion for technology and creating content to educate others has evolved over the years.
He's also the host and creator behind the "Jon Myer Podcast" as a professional storyteller and podcaster, helping others bring their stories to life.