My exam preparation AWS CSA

I was thinking about doing some certification in cloud technology for long time. Finally I decided to do my first cloud certification on Amazon Web Service in December 2016, since they were leading in the cloud market for infrastructure as a service (IAS).

Currently I am working on a private cloud migration project using open stack and most of my experience is with infrastructure technology like storage, compute, network, security etc, I chosen AWS Solution Architect path first.

I will go through each and every thing I did to prepare this exam, please note that I am new to Amazon product portfolio.

Time to complete the exam will be 80 minutes and there will be 60 questions as of now, there is no passing score declared as per my understanding it will vary according to the overall passing ratio.

• Read complete exam blue print once before starting your preparation.
• I bought AWS official study guide from Amazon and this book provided me holistic view about AWS portfolio and a very fundamental knowledge about each products. But I couldn’t do any practice, so it was little bit dry to read in the first time.
• Also completed all the practice question at end of each chapter.

• After completing the official guide I searched for a video based training which will help me to do some hands on lab as well. I found that A cloud Guru by Ryan Kroonenburg is one of the best.
• I started video based training and also the hands on lab with a free tier access.
• AWS provides free tier account for everyone to practice all the products with certain limits, please go through the usage policy in the AWS free tier account.
• I really enjoyed hosting web servers, load balancer’s, object storage using API,and your own private network in couple of minutes globally, in traditional way it takes weeks.
• Also attended all the practice questions at end of each chapter.
• Due to project related issues I could not focus for two to three weeks and again I came back and read the official study guide once again.
• Second time reading the book was so easy and I was having the confidence to give the exam.
• It is recommended to read all AWS FAQ and white papers listed in Amazon site, but due to time constraint I have gone through the security white paper (must read)and couple of FAQ on SWS, Cloud Front, S3, e.t.c.
• Finally I have gone through all practice questions available in the internet and Wiley test bank which provided with purchase of official study guide.
• Exam tips. Questions are based on different scenario as an architect they want to test your knowledge on how you fit each product in different scenario and always keep on eye on the clock.

Good Luck for all exam takers!