The middle-tier title used by the Amazon Web Services (AWS) certification program is Associate, and currently there are three paths to becoming an AWS Certified Associate: Solutions Architect, Developer, and SysOps Administrator. It is the latter certification exam (SOA-C01) that the focus is on this month.

Divided into seven domains, the current exam is priced at $150 and the passing score is 720 on a range from 100 to 1000. All questions are multiple choice or multiple response. How well do you know AWS and administration-based concepts? What follows is a self-test of twenty-five questions based on the general concepts documented online.

In all cases, pick the best answer(s) to each question. The answers appear at the end of the questions. Good luck!

1. The AWS VPN CloudHub can be used with or without a VPC and operates using which simple model?
A. hub-and-spoke
B. subscriber
C. bus and ring
D. daisy chain

2. How many pillars is the AWS Well-Architected Framework based on?
A. four
B. five
C. six
D. seven

3. Building a source code repository on AWS involves creating an Amazon EC2 instance and remotely installing what on it?
A. standby redundancy
B. ghosting software
C. version control software
D. horizontal scaling

4. Which of the following is not one of the four best practice areas for cost optimization in the cloud?
A. Cost effective resources
B. Expenditure awareness
C. Optimizing over time
D. Matching supply and demand
E. Metering volume usage

5. Which of the following two methods does Amazon RDS provide for backing up and restoring DB Instance(s)? (Choose two)
A. tarballs
B. database snapshots
C. automated backups
D. sticky points

6. The most recent version of the digital signature calculation process used for credentialing with AWS calculates the signature using which protocol?
A. HMAC-SHA1
B. HMAC-SHA256
C. HMAC-MD5
D. HMAC-MD56

7. Which of the following is a template containing the software configuration that you can run on Amazon EC2?
A. AMI
B. AMP
C. VCR
D. VHI

8. Some AWS Premium Support plans include access to which tool that helps identify common security misconfigurations and underutilized resources?
A. Amazon Snowfort
B. AWS Informant
C. Trusted Advisor
D. Stoolpigeon

9. VPC connectivity between VPCs is best achieved when using which type of IP ranges for each VPC being connected.
A. overlapping
B. nonoverlapping
C. duplicated
D. redundant

10. In on-premises environments, customers typically have a central team for technology architecture that acts as an overlay to other product or feature teams to ensure they follow best practices. These technology architecture teams use either TOGAF or the [Fill in the blank] Framework as part of the enterprise architecture capability.
A. Collette
B. Bachmann
C. Zachman
D. Pianki

11. Which of the following is an Amazon storage service that offers a native API and is available via the Internet?
A. Amazon Archive
B. Amazon Glacier
C. Amazon Pegasus
D. Amazon Jungle

12. With which AWS service is it possible to centrally manage users, security credentials, access keys, and permissions policies that control which AWS services and resources users can access?
A. IAM
B. AMI
C. AIM
D. IMA
E. MIA

13. Which pillar of the AWS Well-Architected Framework includes the ability to run and monitor systems to deliver business value and to continually improve supporting processes and procedures?
A. Performance Efficiency
B. Cost Optimization
C. Reliability
D. Operational Excellence

14. Which of the following is true regarding when you stop an instance? (Choose all that apply)
A. the compute resources are released
B. no further hourly charges for the instance apply
C. the Amazon EBS volume stores the state
D. the next time you start the instance, it will have the working data as it did before you stopped it
E. any data stored on ephemeral drives will be available after the stop/start sequence

15. What type of VPC connection is a networking connection between two VPCs that enables routing using each VPC's private IP addresses as if they were in the same network?
A. sifting
B. raking
C. gazing
D. peering
E. investigative

Please visit GoCertify to attempt the remaining 10 questions of this quiz.



ANSWERS
1. A
2. B
3. C
4. E
5. B and C
6. B
7. A
8. C
9. B
10. C
11. B
12. A
13. D
14. A, B, C, and D
15. D