42049 Architecting on Amazon Web Services
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Subject handbook information prior to 2025 is available in the Archives.
Credit points: 6 cp
Result type: Grade and marks
Requisite(s): ((41001 Cloud Computing and Software as a Service AND (120 credit points of completed study in Bachelor's Degree owned by FEIT OR 120 credit points of completed study in Bachelor's Honours Embedded owned by FEIT OR 120 credit points of completed study in Bachelor's Combined Degree owned by FEIT OR 120 credit points of completed study in Bachelor's Combined Honours owned by FEIT OR 120 credit points of completed study in Bachelor's Combined Degree co-owned by FEIT OR 120 credit points of completed study in Bachelor's Combined Honours co-owned by FEIT)) OR 42904 Cloud Computing and Software as a Service )
Description
Enterprises across the globe and of all sizes have either moved or are moving their workloads to the Cloud. AWS is the top cloud infrastructure provider in the world. As such, persons with AWS skills and knowledge are in high demand globally.
The Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology (FEIT) has been selected by Amazon Web Services (AWS) to participate in the AWS Academy. As a part of this academy, FEIT offers a subject focused on developing and deploying practical enterprise grade applications in the Cloud. In this course students are exposed to and learn about engineering, building and deploying applications on the AWS Cloud. On completion of this short program students would have gained enough knowledge and skills to be an AWS certified Solutions Architect (Associate).
The subject is based on the content of the authorized AWS Academy curriculum.
Subject learning objectives (SLOs)
Upon successful completion of this subject students should be able to:
| 1. | Identity and express where and how AWS services can be used to solve a business problem. (B.1) |
|---|---|
| 2. | Comparative analysis and justification of the selected AWS services for solving business problem. (C.1, D.1) |
Course intended learning outcomes (CILOs)
This subject also contributes specifically to the development of the following Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILOs):
- Socially Responsible: FEIT graduates identify, engage, and influence stakeholders, and apply expert judgment establishing and managing constraints, conflicts and uncertainties within a hazards and risk framework to define system requirements and interactivity. (B.1)
- Design Oriented: FEIT graduates apply problem solving, design thinking and decision-making methodologies in new contexts or to novel problems, to explore, test, analyse and synthesise complex ideas, theories or concepts. (C.1)
- Technically Proficient: FEIT graduates apply theoretical, conceptual, software and physical tools and advanced discipline knowledge to research, evaluate and predict future performance of systems characterised by complexity. (D.1)
Teaching and learning strategies
Students will attend lectures and labs every week. The exact duration of the lectures and labs (combined) varies from one week to another. However, it would be between 4 to 6 hours per week. Students will be provided materials prior to the lecture that they are expected to read and come to the lecture. Some aspects of the lectures will be flipped wherein students will be expected to work in groups for solving problem.
Students apply the knowledge delivered in lectures by designing solutions to two AWS-provided case studies using the AWS stack. Students work in groups to solve these case studies. Apart from the technical content they also learn about group work and collaboration. Furthermore, the labs each week would contribute to their learning process as well.
Content (topics)
1. Cloud and AWS Service Review
2. Designing the Network
3. Designing for High Availability
4. Automating Your Infrastructure
5. Decoupling Your Infrastructure
6. Designing Web-Scale Media
7. Well-Architected Framework
8. Troubleshooting
9. Design Patterns and Sample Architectures
Assessment
Assessment task 1: Quiz
| Intent: | Quiz – Assess students' understanding of lecture content |
|---|---|
| Objective(s): | This assessment task addresses the following subject learning objectives (SLOs): 1 and 2 This assessment task contributes to the development of the following Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILOs): B.1 and C.1 |
| Type: | Quiz/test |
| Groupwork: | Individual |
| Weight: | 20% |
| Length: | Administered in the lab. Students will be required to completed about 5-6 MCQs at the beginning of each lab. Once the MCQs have been answered they can start their lab activities. |
Assessment task 2: Minor Project
| Intent: | Minor project - Assess student’s skills or architecting using AWS on a given business problem |
|---|---|
| Objective(s): | This assessment task addresses the following subject learning objectives (SLOs): 1 and 2 This assessment task contributes to the development of the following Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILOs): B.1, C.1 and D.1 |
| Type: | Project |
| Groupwork: | Group, individually assessed |
| Weight: | 30% |
| Length: | 2000 words report. |
Assessment task 3: Major Project
| Intent: | Major project – Assess student’s design and development skills using AWS services on a given business problem. The business problem used for this assessment item is different from the one in the minor project. |
|---|---|
| Objective(s): | This assessment task addresses the following subject learning objectives (SLOs): 1 and 2 This assessment task contributes to the development of the following Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILOs): B.1, C.1 and D.1 |
| Type: | Project |
| Groupwork: | Group, individually assessed |
| Weight: | 50% |
| Length: | 2500 words report. |
Minimum requirements
In order to pass the subject, a student must achieve an overall mark of 50% or more.
Required texts
AWS provides thorough slides and lecture notes for student learning
Recommended texts
AWS provides videos and other content for further learning.