Architecture Simplified

How to Prepare for GCP Certification?

2021-01-06T19:28:00.010+05:30

Are you new to Google Cloud and not sure how to start on it?

Are you looking for Google Cloud Certification and not sure how to prepare for the certification?

Here is an opportunity to get your queries resolved in Free Consulting Webinar on How to Prepare for Google Cloud Certifications.

Technology is changing rapidly these days. If you are part of IT industry, you might have seen the impact of these changes at your workplace in the last decade. For example, DevOps emerged and became an integral part of your project development. Same goes with Agile, Microservices, Cloud Computing etc.

Cloud Computing is not a new buzzword now. There are many organizations who already started using Cloud resources, others are in the process of doing so. But gradually, most of the organizations will adopt Cloud Computing.

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In such a scenario, it is very important that you understand how to work with Cloud resources, how to use its services.

If you don't know from where to start or even if you have started your Cloud journey and looking for getting certified, and looking for guidance on how to prepare for it - here is an opportunity.

Architecture Simplified organized FREE Consulting webinar on How to Prepare for Google Cloud certification. The Webinar is planned on 8-Jan-2021 at 7 pm IST.

Below is the registration form. Fill the form to get Webinar details.

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Compute Engine - gcloud Commands

2020-12-21T06:18:00.008+05:30

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You can use 'gcloud' command-line tool to create and manage Google Compute Engine resources.

Set your Project as default in which you want to create Compute Engine instance

gcloud config set project your-project-id

Create Compute Engine instance named test-instance-1 in zone us-central1-a

gcloud compute instances create test-instance-1 --zone us-central1-a

Connect to Compute Engine instance using SSH

gcloud compute ssh --zone us-central1-a test-instance-1

To List all instances

gcloud compute instances list

To List instances with a label, for example - key="production" and value="paymentserver"

gcloud compute instances list --filter='labels.production:paymentserver'

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Qwiklabs Access

2020-12-21T06:07:00.010+05:30

Qwiklabs for Google Cloud Platform labs

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Qwkilabs provides you access to the Google Cloud environment so that you can perform hands-on activities and understand GCP services in more detail.

You can get one month free access to Qwiklabs Google Cloud Platform labs by using below steps -

Step 1 - Go to below link and register to get free trail code https://inthecloud.withgoogle.com/certification-preparation/register.html

Step 2 - Create a new account to Qwiklabs, if you don't have any.

Step 3 - Sign out from Qwiklabs

Step 4 - Click on the below link by replacing <free-trial-code> with the actual free trial code received as part of step 1 -

https://google.qwiklabs.com/focuses/2794?parent=catalog&qlcampaign=<free-trial-code>

The link will look like below -

https://google.qwiklabs.com/focuses/2794?parent=catalog&qlcampaign=1m-certprep-466

In case, above link is not working, you can contact Qwkilabs Support team by logging into the Qwiklabs and share the free-trial-code, they can share the updated link with you.

Step 5 - Sign in again

Step 6 - Perform the lab

Once you end the lab you will get the free one month subscription

Anytime you try any lab by clicking on Start Lab button, you need to select Use Subscription option.

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Google Cloud Free Trial Account Creation

2020-12-21T05:33:00.007+05:30

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Google provides you to create a Free Trial Google Account with a credit limit of $300 which is valid to be used for 90 days.

There are few services which are free to be used within certain limit in Google Account. These services within specified limits are free for all accounts (Free and paid accounts).

If you use the free services within specified limits, there won't be any deduction from $300 from your free trial account.

Free trial end when either of below ends first -

You have used $300 credit limit
90 days period is exhausted

You can check the remaining credit balance and the number of remaining days details on the Billing Account overview page.

While registering for the free trail google Cloud account, you need to mention your credit card details, but you won't be automatically charged unless you upgrade your account to paid account.

The credit details are asked to avoid any invalid user registration.

Free Trial credits apply to all Google Cloud resources but with few exceptions -

GPUs can’t be added to VM instances

Quota increment can’t be requested

VM instances can’t be created using Windows Server images

Few Use Cases can’t be performed like mining cryptocurrency

SLAs are not applied in Free trial

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Steps to create Free Trial Google Cloud Account -

Step 1 - Login to Gmail account with which you want to create Google Cloud account

Step 2 -Open the free trial registration page

https://console.cloud.google.com/freetrial

Step 3 - Complete the registration form by filling your

Address details
Credit Card details
No need to mention PAN details as those are optional
Also, ensure that you select Account Type as "Individual" as you are creating this account for your own hands-on purpose.

Step 4 - Read and agree to the terms of service

Step 5 - Click Accept and start free trial

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Google Services Outage

2020-12-14T19:21:00.005+05:30

Google has such a great infrastructure and wide network connectivity across the world. But today 14-Dec-2020, there was an outage in Gmail, YouTube and few other Google services as well for some time. It is restored now.

During this downtime- so many messages float on internet that why Gmail is not working or YouTube is not working.

This outage was not usual, but it happened. This downtime caused worry in few people as they thought that there is some problem with their Gmail account.

It is said that problem was caused related to Google's authentication tool. So, the services which requires authentication, faced the issue. If you were already logged in, then the service was working fine.

This is a great example to understand why keeping your application up & running all the time is so important. You should plan for Disaster Recovery and should have strong backup strategy. Along with that, your entire architecture should be designed in such a way that all the components are resilient and provide high availability.

Google has already taken care of High Availability and resiliency of its applications, still there was an outage. This caused worry in few customers. Can you imagine if you do not take care of high availability in your application and it causes outage, how bad it can be for success of your application? So, having a resilient and high availability architecture is very important for success of your application.

To learn more about how to architect well in GCP and learn about Google Professional Cloud Architect certification, check the certification training page.

Google Cloud Bigtable

2020-11-06T22:23:00.004+05:30

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Google Cloud Bigtable is a fully-managed NoSQL database service. It is key-value store type of NoSQL database.
Cloud Bigtable is used for large analytical and operational workloads
Cloud Bigtable is ideal for storing very large amount of data in a key-value store.
Cloud Bigtable provides high read and write throughput at low latency
Cloud Bigtable uses horizontal autoscaling
You can add or reduce more nodes to scale throughput
Cloud Bigtable can store up to Petabytes of data
Cloud Bigtable is suitable data source for MapReduce operations.
Cloud Bigtable is the most suitable for high throughput and scalable applications

Few Use Cases -

Time-series data
Purchase history and customer preferences
Stock prices and currency exchange rates

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When you create Cloud Bigtable instance, you can have up to 4 clusters. Each cluster contains nodes which are computational units.
When you create a table in Cloud Bigtable, it belongs to the Cloud Bigtable instance, not any cluster.
Each cluster is located in a single zone. If you want to create additional clusters, you can do it by creating in other zones in the same region.
When you create a Cloud Bigtable instance, you need to choose if you want to store your data on SSD or HDD. Whatever option you choose, all the clusters and nodes will use the same storage type.
How to choose between SSD and HDD -

Choose HDD for very large dataset, for example >10TB, where latency is not the major concern. You can choose it when data is not frequently accessed. For example - batch workloads or data archival operations.
For latency-sensitive requirement, which requires high performance - you can choose SSD.

Replication across clusters

If your Cloud Bigtable instance has only one cluster then data is not replicated.
If your application requires high availability and you need to provide multi-cluster data replication, then the number of nodes in each cluster should be the same.

Data management in Cloud Bigtable -

Cloud Bigtable stores data in scalable table; composed of rows and columns.
Each row is indexed by a single row key
Columns that are related to one another are grouped in a column family

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GCP - Compute Engine - Pricing Options

2020-10-26T13:16:00.008+05:30

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There are multiple ways how you can get discounts while using Compute Engine instances. To get the discounts, it's important to understand the pricing structure for Google Compute Engine.

The billing for Compute Engine instances is done for each resources used in the instance. For example, each vCPU and each GB of memory used in the Compute Engine instance is billed separately.

If you use a Machine Type with some memory and vCPU, then you won't be billed for the machine type, rather you will be billed for the memory and vCPU separately used by the VM instance.

If you run a VM instance for less than one minute, then also you will be billed on vCPU, GPU and GB of memory for one minute. Because for the first one minute, the billing happens for one minute minimum. One minute onwards, the billing happens per second of usage.

There are some premium images also for which billing applies. For example -

Red Hat Enterprise Linux
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
Windows Server
SQL Server

Resources on the VM instance are charged when the instance is uptime. Instance uptime is calculated since the instance is started and till the instance status becomes Terminated.

Even if you are not using the instance but if your instance is in Running state, then also cost will be incurred.

There are three different kinds of discounts which you can get on Compute Engine instances -

Sustained Use Discount
Committed Use Discount
Preemptible VMs usage Discount

These discount types can't be combined. It means that if you are using Preemptible VM instances and getting that discount, you can't avail Sustained use or Committed use use discount at that time.

Sustained Use Discount

These are automatic discounts that Google cloud provides you for running specific Compute Engine resource for a significant amount of time in a billing month in a region.

These discounts are reset at the beginning of each month.

When you run a Compute Engine instance for more than 25% of the time in a month, then you get some discount depending on the machine type of the VM instance. If you run the instance for more than 50% of the time, you get even more discount. Similarly, if you use the VM instance for 75% or 100% of the time in a month, the discount get increased. But there is a maximum limit of the discount depending on the machine type of the instance.

For general-purpose N1 pre-defined or custom machine type or memory-optimized machine type or shared-core machine type - you get a maximum discount up to 30%.

For general-purpose N2 and N2D pre-defined or custom machine type or compute-optimized machine type - you get a maximum discount up to 20%.

There is a limitation that Sustained use discounts do not apply to E2 machine type.

You can use the Google Cloud Pricing Calculator to estimate your sustained use discount.

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Committed Use Discount

If you know the resource requirements of your workload beforehand and you need to run the workload continuously, you can opt for Committed use discount on running Compute Engine instances.

You get this discount when you are committed to use your VM instances for longer period of time and you get a contract for committed use.

You can go for 1 year or 3 years committed use discount offers. 3 years committed use offers more discount compared to 1 year committed use.

You can purchase a committed use discount for a single project.

You can also purchase multiple committed use discounts to be used across multiple projects in a region.

Though you purchase a committed use discount beforehand, but you are billed on monthly basis till the duration of the contract. It does not require any upfront cost.

You can purchase committed use discount for resources like vCPU, memory, GPU, Local SSD depending on the machine type of the Compute Engine instance.

You can't combine committed use and sustained use discounts on the same resource.
Committed use discounts do not apply to Preemptible VM instances and you can't combine more than one type of discount on the same resource.
Committed use discounts do not apply to N1 shared-core machine type or extended memory.

Preemptible VM Instances

This is a Compute Engine instance that you can run at a much lower price than normal VM instance.

The drawback is that these instances can be stopped at any point, so the workload which it is processing can be left in between.

Because of the above limitation, it is important that you check the workload for which you want to use the Preemptible VM instance.

For example, for your batch jobs, this kind of VM instance will be good as it provides very cost-effective solution to process this kind of workload.

Preemptible VM instances can run for maximum 24 hours and then it is stopped. But it can be stopped before 24 hours as well.

If your preemptible VM is stopped before one minute by the Compute Engine, then you won't be billed for it.

When Compute Engine is about to stop a preemptible VM instance, below steps are taken -

Compute Engine sends a preemption notice to the VM instance.
You can use the shutdown script to handle the preemptible notice and the cleanup activities before the VM instance is stopped.
If the VM instance does not stop after 30 seconds of sending preemptible notice then Compute Engine sends another signal to the operating system.
This makes the VM instance to go in Terminated state.

You can attach persistent disk with preemptible VM instance and don't select "Mark for auto-delete". In that case, when you VM instance is terminated then also you can access the data from the persistent disk. Just that it will incur cost of storage, until you delete the persistent disk.

This is a cost-effective option but there is a trade-off with High Availability. So, it can't be used for HA solutions.

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GCP - Google Compute Engine - Disks Options

2020-10-19T18:17:00.021+05:30

Boot Disks

These are block storage volumes attached to the Google Compute Engine instances on Google Cloud Platform (GCP).

This is the root volume where your images is loaded once you boot the VM instance.

There is only one root volume where your operating system is loaded. Though you can add additional disks but those are not root volume.

Disk Resizing can be done without any downtime.

There are 4 5 types of disks which can be grouped under 2 main categories -

Persistent Disks

Standard Persistent Disks
Balanced Persistent Disks
SSD Persistent Disks
Extreme Persistent Disks (recently added)

Local Disks

Local SSD

Only Persistent disks can be used as boot disks.

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Persistent Disks

Your VM instance and persistent disk are located independent to each other. This is why you can attach one persistent disk to a VM instance at a time and once it is detached from that VM instance, you can attach it to another VM instance.
The data which is stored on the persistence disk can still be available on it even after you detach it from the VM instance - if you select that appropriate option.
Persistence disk performance scales automatically. It means you can resize your persistent disk or can add more persistence disks to your VM instance, based on your requirement.
Google Compute Engines manages the distribution of data to ensure redundancy and optimal performance automatically. It does so by distributing persistent disk data across several physical disks.
Persistent disks can be zonal or regional.
There are ~~three~~ four persistent disk types -

Standard Persistent disks
Balanced Persistent disks
SSD Persistent disks
Extreme Persistent disks (recently added)

Standard Persistent disk (pd-standard)

These can be zonal or regional
These are backed by standard HDD (Hard Disk Drives)
It supports all Machine Types
These are highly efficient and reliable block storage
Regional Standard persistent disk provides synchronous replication across two zones in a region
This is default disk type attached to VM
Use Case -

large data processing workloads that primarily use sequential I/Os.

Balanced Persistent disk (pd-balanced)

These can be zonal or regional
These are backed by SSD (Solid-State Drives)
This is a cost-effective solution to SSD persistent disks where it balances between performance and cost.
These are cost-effective and reliable block storages
Regional Balanced persistent disk provides synchronous replication across two zones in a region
Use Case -

Since this is a cost-effective alternative to SSD PD, so for the same maximum IOPS as SSD PD and lower IOPS per GB.
Balanced PD offers performance levels suitable for most general purpose applications.

SSD Persistent disks (pd-ssd)

These can be zonal or regional
These are backed by SSD (Solid-State Drives)
These are fast and reliable block storage.
Regional Balanced persistent disk provides synchronous replication across two zones in a region
Use Case -

suitable for high-performance database needs and enterprise applications.
This can be used for low latency (for example - single-digit millisecond latency) requirement.
This provides higher IOPS compared to Standard PD.

Extreme Persistent disks (pd-extreme) (recently added)

These are currently available in only few zones.
These can be zonal only
These are backed by SSD (Solid-State Drives)
Unlike other disk types, you can chose your desired IOPS level (in the range of 10K to 120K IOPS)
In order to get maximum performance levels offered by extreme persistent disks, you must attach your extreme persistent disks to virtual machine (VM) instances that are large machine types like M1, or M2, or N2-64 and larger machine types..
Image can not be created from this disk type.
This disk type can not be resized if mounted to a VM instance.
Use Case -

It provides high performance for both random access workloads and bulk throughput.
It is designed for high-end database workloads.

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Local SSD

Unlike Persistent disks, Local SSDs are physically attached to the VM instances.
Since these are physically attached to one VM instance, so it is available to single instance only.
These are designed to provide higher IOPS and lower latency compared to PDs.
Once the VM instance is stopped or deleted, the data stored on local SSDs are deleted. So, be sure to store data of permanent value somewhere else.
Local SSD's performance depends on the interface you choose. There are two interfaces -

SCSI
NVMe

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GCP - Compute Engine

2020-10-19T12:17:00.023+05:30

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What is Google Compute Engine?

Google Compute Engine (GCE) is a Virtual Machine which is created on the Google Cloud Infrastructure.

Google Compute Engine is an example of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS).

Google Compute Engine helps you to create scalable computing capacity on Google Cloud Infrastructure. It means you can spin up or spin down Compute Engine VMs on GCP based on your requirement.

Once you don't need the computing capacity, you can stop the Compute Engine instance and then no cost will be incurred further.

You can choose Compute Engine configuration (like RAM, CPU etc) based on your requirement.

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When to Choose Google Compute Engine?

When you need control over infrastructure and direct access to compute and network resources
When you need to make Operating System-level changes
While migrating the application, if you don't want to rewrite the code

Ways to Create Google Compute Engine

You can create Compute Engine in three ways -

Using Google Cloud Console - Google Cloud Console in an UI using which you can easily navigate to different services and resources on the Google Cloud.

Using Command-line tool 'gcloud' - You can use Command-line tool gcloud also to create Compute Engine.

You can run gcloud command on Cloud Shell which is accessed through browser itself. It is embedded in Cloud Console UI.
Or, you can install Google Cloud SDK on your system and then can use gcloud command-line tool.

Using RESTful Compute Engine API - You use this option when you need to call the Compute Engine API service from your application's code. You can do this by using Google-provided client libraries.

Create Google Compute Engine Instance

You need to specify below parameters to create Google Compute Engine instance -

Specify the Region and Zone in which you want to create it. Based on the Region, the cost to create the instance will vary.

You will choose Machine Type to specify the CPU and memory configurations needed for the Compute Engine instance. There are pre-defined Machine Types and custom Machine Types options available. You can choose it based on your requirement.

For workloads like machine learning and data processing - take advantage of GPUs. Many GCP zones have GPU's available.

You need to install Operating system, other required software and other configurations to create Compute Engine instance. So, you can use Images.

You need to attach a persistent storage boot disk to Compute Engine instance. This is needed to install Operating System, store data etc. Apart from the primary boot disk, you can create multiple secondary boot disks for Compute Engine instance.

There are different ways in which pricing is done on Compute Engine instance resources. Also, there are multiple Discount Options which you can avail based on your requirement.

Startup Script

Startup script is used to start VMs with certain configurations like installing software packages on first boot.
Other kinds of metadata can also be passed in the startup script.

Instance Groups

In case of horizontal scaling or scale-out, VM instances are added and removed as per the need.
You can create Instance Group for specified purpose and add or remove VM instances as per the traffic.

Scale-up and Scale-out Use Cases

For Memory-intensive and Compute-intensive workloads, scale-out option is preferred; where you add more RAM and CPUs to the same VM.
For resilient and scalable solutions, scale-up option is preferred; where you create more VMs to handle increase in traffic.

Reference Topics Covered on this Page

GCP - Google Compute Engine - Machine Type

2020-10-19T12:12:00.014+05:30

What is Machine Type?

Machine Type is a template of virtualized hardware resources needed to instantiate the Google Compute Engine instances on Google Cloud Platform (GCP). The template contains resources like memory, virtual CPU, persistent disk storage.

Compute Engine - Machine Type

Generally, one physical CPU is equal to 2 virtual CPU (vCPU).

If a VM instance is running and you change Machine Type, it will restart the VM.

There are two main types of Machine Type -

Pre-defined Machine Type
Custom Machine Type

Pre-defined Machine Type -

Standard -

these are General Purpose machines. These provide good balance of price and performance.
The CPU (up to 32 vCPU) and Memory (maximum 8 GB per vCPU; total up to 128 GB memory) configurations are at average level and so these can be used in most of the use cases where neither high processing nor high memory requirements are mentioned.
Use Cases - day-to day computing at lower cost like web serving, back-office applications, small-medium-large databases, media-streaming, microservices etc.
Examples are - E2, N1, N2, N2D

High CPU -

These are used where you have a requirement of high processing but not that high memory is needed.
These provide high-performance for compute-optimized use cases. In these machine types, the virtual CPU is more compared to memory.
Use Cases - ultra high performance for compute-intensive workloads like gaming.
Example - C2

High Memory -

These are used where you have high memory-optimized requirements.
If need high in-memory databases, then you can use this machine type. This is the case of high-memory but not that high CPU.
Use Cases -ultra high performance for memory-intensive workloads like in-memory analytics, large in-memory databases etc.
Example - M2

Shared Core -

These provide a single vCPU that runs on one hyper-thread of the host CPU. These are used for multi-tasking on the same physical machine.
In the CPU bursting, instances that are using shared-core machine type - they can use additional physical CPU for short period of time.
Use Cases - cost-effective solution for small or batch workloads.
Example - A2

Custom Machine Type

When pre-defined Machine Types are not able to fulfill your requirement.
For example, if you have a requirement of CPU more than provided by General-purpose machine types but less than Compute-optimized
Use Cases - more processing power or memory power than General-purpose machine types but less than compute-intensive or memory-intensive machine types.

GCP - Compute Engine - Images

2020-10-19T12:07:00.014+05:30

Images

While creating a Compute Engine instance on Google Cloud Platform (GCP), you can choose Image.

An Image contains boot loader, operating system, file system structure and any software & configurations which you want to be available after boot load.

A persistent boot disk is created for the instance when you use an image. The default size of boot disk as per the image you selected. But you can modify the size of persistent boot disk, if needed.

There are three types of Images -

Public Images
Custom Images
Shielded vs Non-shielded Images

Public Images

These are preconfigured Images
You can choose Windows and Linux Images.
These are provided and maintained by GCP, open source communities or third-party vendors.
There is an additional cost involved for third-party vendor images.
By default, all projects have access to these public images.
Many Windows and Linux Images are available as public images with its pre-defined specifications.
Most public images are available at no additional cost.
Premium public images have additional cost involved.

Custom Images

You can create an image from your existing VM instances so that next time when you need similar boot configurations, you can use the same image.
These are created from boot disks and other images.
Since these images are created by you, so you would have control access on it.
These are available only to your project.
You can use one custom image and make some more changes to it. Then you can create another image which will have your updates as well. Next time, when you need more VM instances with the same configurations, you can use the same.
If you are making changes to your custom images regularly, then you can group them as image family.
The image family contains all the custom images. But it points to the most recent image only. So that if you want to create more VM instances using these templates, you can simply use the image family which is pointing to the latest image. This way you will not have to worry about updating the reference of latest custom image.
If you want to use previous version of image in the image family, then you need to deprecate the latest version as image family never points to older images.

Shielded vs Non-shielded Images

These are verified public images with additional security features such as secure boot, vTPM (virtual Trust Platform Module), measured boot, integrity monitoring.

Encryption at Rest in Storage Systems in GCP

2020-10-07T21:36:00.007+05:30

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As part of the security features, Google Cloud Platform encrypts all the data in all storage system. The data is encrypted before storing it in the storage system.

This is how the customer data is encrypted before storing it to storage systems.

Pic 1 : Steps Taken while Encryption

Once the data in encrypted, it can't be used in this format. So the data needs to be decrypted before using. These are the steps taken when the encrypted data needs to be retrieved from the storage systems.

Pic 2: Steps Taken While Decryption

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GCP - Cloud Storage gsutil Commands

2020-10-06T21:09:00.008+05:30

Why to Learn gsutil Command?

In the GCP certification exam, there will be few questions based on the gsutil commands.
If you are working on Google Cloud projects, then also you should be knowing about these commands as these are faster way to work on Cloud Storage.

What is gsutil?

gsutil is a Command-line tool to work with Google Cloud Storage through CLI. You can install Google Cloud SDK and other command-line tools on your system like gcloud, gsutil and kubectl.

There is another way to access these command-line tools is through Cloud Shell. Cloud Shell is an instance provisioned with 5TB persistent disk storage. This is embedded in the Google Cloud Console itself so you can access it from the browser. gcloud, gsutil and kubectl command-line tools are already installed in it.

Useful gsutil Commands

Command to Create Bucket

gsutil mb -b on -l us-east1 gs://my-first-bucket/

mb - make bucket

-b - to specify the uniform bucket-level access setting. Default is 'off'. It can be set as 'on' as done in the above command.

-l - to specify the location in which you want to create bucket

us-east1 - location in which you want to create bucket

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will create a bucket my-first-bucket in us-east1 region.

Command to Create Bucket with more Specifications

gsutil mb -c nearline -l europe-west1 -p myproject1 --retention 2m gs://my-first-bucket/

mb - make bucket

-c - to specify the storage class.

-l - to specify the location in which you want to create bucket

-p - to specify the project with which you want to associate this bucket

--retention - to specify the retention period of objects in the bucket. It can be specified in s (seconds), d (days), m (months) or y (year). If don't specify, there won't be any retention policy applied to the objects in the bucket.

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will create a bucket my-first-bucket in europe-west1 region with the storage class as nearline, in the myproject1 project and the objects inside the bucket will have retention period of 2 months.

Command to Upload files to Bucket

gsutil cp Data/cloud.png gs://my-first-bucket

cp - copy

Data/cloud.png - file to be copied with its path

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will upload cloud.png file from your local folder Data to the bucket my-first-bucket.

Command to Upload all the files from a folder to Bucket

gsutil cp -r Data gs://my-first-bucket

cp - copy

-r - to specify all files from a folder

Data - name of the folder from which all files need to be uploaded

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will upload Data folder with all its contents to the bucket my-first-bucket.

Command to Upload multiple files in Parallel Multi-threaded way to Bucket

gsutil -m cp -r Data gs://my-first-bucket

-m - copy large number of files in a parallel multi-threaded/multi-processing way

cp - copy

-r - to specify all files from a folder

Data - name of the folder from which all files need to be uploaded

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will upload Data folder with all its contents to the bucket my-first-bucket in a parallel multi-threaded way.

Command to List Content of a Bucket

gsutil ls gs://my-first-bucket

ls - list

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will return the object names inside the bucket my-first-bucket.

Command to List Details of Object inside a Bucket

gsutil ls -l gs://my-first-bucket/cloud.png

ls - list

-l - flag to get details of object

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will return the object cloud.png details like size of object, Creation Date inside the bucket my-first-bucket.

Command to Download the Object from a Bucket

gsutil cp gs://my-first-bucket/cloud.png DataFolder/

cp - copy

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will copy the object cloud.png from the bucket my-first-bucket to DataFolder on your machine.

Command to Grant Read-permission of Objects inside a Bucket to All Users

gsutil iam ch allUsers:objectViewer gs://my-first-bucket

iam ch- to change the IAM permission

allUsers:objectViewer - changing the permission to objectViewer, i.e Read access to all users.

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will grant read access of objects inside the bucket my-first-bucket to all users.

Command to Remove Public access of Objects inside a Bucket

gsutil iam ch -d allUsers:objectViewer gs://my-first-bucket

iam ch- to change the IAM permission

-d allUsers:objectViewer - delete the objectViewer, i.e Read access to all users.

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will remove the read access of objects inside the bucket my-first-bucket to all users.

Command to Grant Read permission of Objects inside a Bucket to Specific User

gsutil iam ch user:abc@gmail.com:objectViewer gs://my-first-bucket

iam ch- to change the IAM permission

user:abc@gmail.com:objectViewer - changing the permission to objectViewer, i.e Read access to user abc@gmail.com.

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will grant read access of objects inside the bucket my-first-bucket to user abc@gmail.com.

Command to Grant Read-Write permission of Objects inside a Bucket to Specific User

gsutil iam ch user:abc@gmail.com:objectCreator,objectViewer gs://my-first-bucket

iam ch- to change the IAM permission

user:abc@gmail.com:objectCreator,objectViewer - changing the permission to objectCreator and objectViewer, i.e Write & Read access to user abc@gmail.com.

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will grant read & write access of objects inside the bucket my-first-bucket to user abc@gmail.com.

Command to Remove the specific user's permissions of Objects inside a Bucket

gsutil iam ch -d user:abc@gmail.com:objectCreator, objectViewer gs://my-first-bucket

iam ch- to change the IAM permission

-d user:abc@gmail.com:objectCreator,objectViewer - delete the objectCreator, objectViewer, i.e Write & Read access from user abc@gmail.com.

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will remove the read & write access of objects inside the bucket my-first-bucket from user abc@gmail.com.

Command to Delete an Object from a Bucket

gsutil rm gs://my-first-bucket/cloud.png

rm- to remove

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

cloud.png - name of the object to be removed

This command will remove the object cloud.png from the bucket my-first-bucket.

Command to Delete a Bucket and all contents inside the Bucket

gsutil rm -r gs://my-first-bucket

rm -r- to remove all recursively

my-first-bucket - name of the bucket (it should be globally unique)

This command will remove the bucket my-first-bucket anad all objects inside it recursively.

Command to get help on specific gsutil command line option

gsutil help cp

This command will provide you details on gsutil cp command.

Command to get details on gsutil top-level command line options

gsutil help option

This command will provide you details on all gsutil top-level command line options.

Database Basics with Joins and Unions

2020-08-06T20:51:00.004+05:30

Most of the people coming from different technical and educational background when they start their Data Science journey they may face problems in understanding databases. For example, what is database? What is Primary key? What are different types of tables like Transaction table and Reference table? What are different types of joins? What are different types of Data? What is Data Warehousing? What is Data Lake? What is Data Mining, etc.?

This is a series of articles where we will have crisp and concise contents to cover all these aspects so that you are able to start your Data Science journey

with basic knowledge of database.

In this particular article, we will go through with the basics of database -

What is Database
What is Structured Data
Primary key as single column vs Composite Primary key
How to Create Table in Database
How Create Table query changes when working with a Primary Key and Foreign Key
Insert Data into the Table
Types of Table
What is Join and Types of Join
What is Union and how it differs from Join

What is Database

Let's first understand what is database? You can think of a database as a placeholder for data where data is organized in some particular way. Depending on type of data, i.e whether it is Structured, Semi-Structured or Unstructured data - there can be different ways in which data can be arranged.

We will first talk about how Structured data is organized.

What is Structured Data?

Structured data is one which adheres to a schema. A Schema is a set of rules with which data is organized in the database.

A database can have multiple tables. In tables, data is organized in rows and columns. You can think of excel where data is organized in rows and columns. In tables also, we have data organized in rows and columns with some set of rules.

Now, consider a scenario of a Bank database. In the Bank database, we have considered 2 tables for now - Customer table and Accounts table. Customer table has Customer_ID as the Primary key.

Primary key as single column vs Composite Primary key

A Primary key is a non-null column in the table which uniquely identifies a row in the table. The values in the Primary key column is unique, so the values can’t be repeated in the Primary key column. A Primary key can be a single column or a combination of multiple columns, which is called a Composite Primary key. You can refer Primary key as Composite key at the end of this article - to get more details on it.

How to Create Table in Database

The Customer table contains other columns like Customer_Name, Account_Number, Account_Type and the Balance_Amount to reflect the amount available in the account.

Customer Table

Customer_ID	Customer_Name	Account_Number	Account_Type	Balance_Amount
Cust100	John Taylor	Acc100	Savings	60000
Cust101	David Williams	Acc101	Current	50000
Cust102	Tracy Smith	Acc 102	Savings	55000
Cust103	Emma Jones	Acc103		52000

Below is the SQL Command to create the Customer table -

CREATE TABLE Customer (

Customer_ID varchar(10),

Customer_Name varchar(40),

Account_Number varchar(10),

Account_Type varchar(20),

Balance_Amount int );

In the above SQL command, we have mentioned the table name and column names along with the data type of the column.

We have another table called Accounts which has Account_Type as Primary key. It has other columns Credit_Limit and Minimum_Balance needed to maintain in a particular Account Type.

Accounts Table

Account_Type	Credit_Limit	Minimum_Balance
Savings	10000	500
Current	20000	2000
Car Loan	500000	20000
Mortgages	1000000	90000

Below is the SQL Command to create the Accounts table -

CREATE TABLE Accounts (

Account_Type varchar(20),

Credit_Limit int,

Minimum_Balance int );

Now, couple of things to observe here -

1. While creating tables, we have not defined any column or columns as Primary Key in both the tables.

2. The two tables 'Customer' and 'Accounts' are created separately and they have no relation mentioned between them.

3. The data type of Account_Type column in both the tables is defined as varchar(20).

How Create Table query changes when working with a Primary Key and Foreign Key

In the Accounts table, there is a column named Account_Type. This Account_Type column is a Primary key in Accounts table, because if you specify any value of this column, it will uniquely identify a row in the Accounts table.

So, you can create Accounts table by specifying the Account_Type as the Primary key. Your SQL command to create table will change as below -

CREATE TABLE Accounts (

Account_Type varchar(20),

Credit_Limit int,

Minimum_Balance int,

PRIMARY KEY (Account_Type) );

In the Customer table Customer_ID is the Primary key. So, while creating the table, we can specify this column as the Primary key.

Now, notice that in the Customer table, there is a column named Account_Type as well. So, when one table has a column that refers another table’s primary key - then that column is a foreign key. So, in this case, Account_Type column in Customer table is a foreign key.

The way we created two tables earlier, there was no relation between them. But if you want to have a relationship defined between tables, then you can do so while creating tables.

Use below SQL query to create Customer table by defining its primary and foreign keys.

CREATE TABLE Customer (

Customer_ID varchar(10),

Customer_Name varchar(40) NOT NULL,

Account_Number varchar(10),

Account_Type varchar(20),

Balance_Amount int,

PRIMARY KEY (Customer_ID),

FOREIGN KEY (Account_Type) REFERENCES Accounts(Account_Type)

);

Now, observe couple of changes made in the SQL Query -

1. A column Customer_ID is defined as a Primary key.

2. Using Foreign Key keyword, an association is created between the Customer and Accounts tables.

3. Customer_Name column is now specified as Not Null. So, this column can't have any null value in it. This is a constraint which we added on this column.

When a column is defined as a Primary key, there are few restrictions already added on it, without explicitly specifying -

a) it can not have any null value.

b) it must be unique across all the rows.

c) it must uniquely identify a row in the table

Whereas a Foreign key column may have null values in it.

Insert Data into the Table

When you specified Accounts table's column as a Foreign key for Customers table, it means your Customer table data will refer to Accounts table data. So, you should first insert data into the Accounts table and then into the Customer table.

Add data in the Accounts table using below INSERT INTO command -

INSERT INTO Accounts

Values ('Savings', 10000, 500);

Insert data into the Customer table using below -

INSERT INTO Customer

VALUES ('Cust100', 'John Taylor', 'Acc100', 'Savings', 60000);

Types of Table

Now, observe the data inside the two tables.

Customer Table

Customer_ID	Customer_Name	Account_Number	Account_Type	Balance_Amount
Cust100	John Taylor	Acc100	Savings	60000
Cust101	David Williams	Acc101	Current	50000
Cust102	Tracy Smith	Acc 102	Savings	55000
Cust103	Emma Jones	Acc103		52000

The Customer table is a Transaction table. What is a Transaction table? The data changes frequently in a Transaction table. In the customer table, you have Balance_Amount column. The value in the column changes whenever the customer withdraws or deposits money to his account.

Accounts Table

Account_Type	Credit_Limit	Minimum_Balance
Savings	10000	500
Current	20000	2000
Car Loan	500000	20000
Mortgages	1000000	90000

Whereas the Accounts table is a Reference table. The values in Credit_Limit and Minimum_Balance in a particular type of account do not change frequently. This table is referred to get more details of a customer account based on its account type.

What is Join and Types of Join

Now, let’s understand when would you need to Join data from two or more tables.

For example, if you want to know credit limit of each customer, then you need to join the two tables as one single table won’t be able to give you this answer.

In this example, we have two tables - Customer and Accounts. The Customer table has a foreign key column “Account_Type” which is primary key of table Accounts. So, we have one common column in these two tables.

When we have a common column between two tables, we can use Join to get rows from two tables based on the given criteria.

There are different kinds of joins -

Inner Join
Left Join
Right Join
Full Outer Join

Inner Join

Inner Join will return only those rows where the common column value matches in both the tables. The visualization can be seen using Venn diagram as below-

Use below SQL query to Inner Join two tables. Here, Table 1 is Customer table and Table 2 is Accounts table.

SELECT * FROM Customer

INNER JOIN Accounts

ON Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type;

So, in this case, if we do Inner Join, the result should be -

Customer table columns Accounts table columns

Now, observe couple of things from the result -

1. There are two Account_Type columns appearing in the result.

2. The left Account_Type column is from the Customer table as Customer table is written in the left (Table1).

3. The right Account_Type column is from the Accounts table as Accounts table is written in the right (Table2).

4. In the result, only those rows are selected where both the tables data matches for column Account_Type.

5. From the Customer table, Customer_ID = 'Cust103' row is not included here as there was no Account_Type mentioned against it.

6. From the Accounts table, Account_Type = 'Car Loan' and 'Mortgages' rows are not selected as there was no such Account_Type in the Customer table.

Left Join

Left Join will return all the rows from the left table and matching rows from the right table.

The visualization can be seen using Venn diagram as below in which all the rows from Table 1 and matching rows from Table 2 will be resulted as output.

Use below SQL query to Left Join two tables. Here, Table 1 is Customer table and Table 2 is Accounts table.

SELECT * FROM Customer

LEFT JOIN Accounts

ON Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type;

So, in this case, if we do Left Join, the result should be -

Customer table columns Accounts table columns

Now, observe couple of things from the result -

1. There are two Account_Type columns appearing in the result. In the Inner Join result also, we observed that common column was appearing from both the tables.

2. The left Account_Type column is from the Customer table as Customer table is written in the left (Table1).

3. The right Account_Type column is from the Accounts table as Accounts table is written in the right (Table2).

4. In the result, all rows are selected from Customer table which is Table1 (left table).

5. From the Accounts table, Account_Type = 'Car Loan' and 'Mortgages' rows are not selected as there was no such Account_Type in the Customer table.

Right Join

Right Join will return all the rows from the right table and matching rows from the left table.

The visualization can be seen using Venn diagram as below in which all the rows from Table 2 and matching rows from Table 1 will be resulted as output.

Use below SQL query to Right Join two tables. Here, Table 1 is Customer table and Table 2 is Accounts table.

SELECT * FROM Customer

RIGHT JOIN Accounts

ON Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type;

So, in this case, if we do Left Join, the result should be -

Customer table columns Accounts table columns

Now, observe couple of things from the result -

1. There are two Account_Type columns appearing in the result.

2. The left Account_Type column is from the Customer table as Customer table is written in the left (Table1).

3. The right Account_Type column is from the Accounts table as Accounts table is written in the right (Table2).

4. In the result, all rows are selected from Accounts table which is Table2 (right table).

5. From the Customer table, Customer_ID = 'Cust103' row is not included here as there was no Account_Type mentioned against it.

Full Outer Join

Full Outer Join will return all the rows from the left table and right table.

The visualization can be seen using Venn diagram as below in which all the rows from Table 1 and Table 2 will be resulted as output.

Use below SQL query to Full Outer Join two tables. Here, Table 1 is Customer table and Table 2 is Accounts table.

SELECT * FROM Customer

FULL OUTER JOIN Accounts

ON Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type;

So, in this case, if we do Full Outer Join, the result should be -

Customer table columns Accounts table columns

Now, observe couple of things from the result -

1. There are two Account_Type columns appearing in the result.

2. The left Account_Type column is from the Customer table as Customer table is written in the left (Table1).

3. The right Account_Type column is from the Accounts table as Accounts table is written in the right (Table2).

4. In the result, all rows are selected from Customer and Accounts table which are Table 1 (left table) and Table2 (right table).

What is Union and How it differs from Joins

Union combines all the rows from the two select statements.

For example, we have two Select statements below. Union combines the result of two SELECT statements.

Select Account_Type from Customer where Balance_Amount >51000

Union

Select Account_Type from Accounts where Credit_Limit >5000

Result here will be -

ACCOUNT_TYPE

Car Loan

Current

Mortgages

Savings

Now, observe couple of points here -

1. There is only one column returned as result.

2. In the result - data retrieved from both the tables are added vertically in a single column. So, we can say that in Union, data scales vertically.

3. The data type and number of columns from both the select statements should be the same else this kind of vertical summation won't be possible.

Execute Full Outer Join With the same criteria

To see the difference between Union and Full Outer Join, we can execute the Full Outer Join statement with the same criteria with which we executed the Union

Select Customer.Account_Type, Accounts.Account_Type from Customer

Full Outer Join Accounts

on Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type

where Accounts.Credit_Limit >5000 or Balance_Amount >51000;

Result here will be -

Customer table Accounts table

ACCOUNT_TYPE	ACCOUNT_TYPE
Savings	Savings
Savings	Savings
Current	Current
-	Car Loan
-	Mortgages
-	-

Execute Inner Join With the same criteria

To see the difference between Union and Inner Join, we can execute the Inner Join statement with the same criteria with which we executed the Union

Select Customer.Account_Type, Accounts.Account_Type from Customer

Inner Join Accounts

on Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type

where Accounts.Credit_Limit >5000 or Balance_Amount >51000;

the result here will be -

Customer table Accounts table

ACCOUNT_TYPE	ACCOUNT_TYPE
Savings	Savings
Savings	Savings
Current	Current

Execute Left Join With the same criteria

To see the difference between Union and Left Join, we can execute the Left Join statement with the same criteria with which we executed the Union

Select Customer.Account_Type, Accounts.Account_Type from Customer

Left Join Accounts

on Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type

where Accounts.Credit_Limit >5000 or Balance_Amount >51000;

The result here will be -

Customer table Accounts table

ACCOUNT_TYPE	ACCOUNT_TYPE
Savings	Savings
Current	Current
Savings	Savings
-	-

Execute Right Join With the same criteria

To see the difference between Union and Right Join, we can execute the Right Join statement with the same criteria with which we executed the Union

Select Customer.Account_Type, Accounts.Account_Type from Customer

Right Join Accounts

on Customer.Account_Type = Accounts.Account_Type

where Accounts.Credit_Limit >5000 or Balance_Amount >51000;

Result here will be -

Customer table Accounts table

ACCOUNT_TYPE	ACCOUNT_TYPE
Savings	Savings
Current	Current
Savings	Savings
-	Mortgages
-	Car Loan

Composite Primary Key

This is where more than one column forms the PRIMARY KEY and uniquely identifies a row in the table.

This is our Customer table which we discussed earlier.

Customer Table

Customer_ID	Customer_Name	Account_Number	Account_Type	Balance_Amount
Cust100	John Taylor	Acc100	Savings	60000
Cust101	David Williams	Acc101	Current	50000
Cust102	Tracy Smith	Acc 102	Savings	55000
Cust103	Emma Jones	Acc103		52000

In the Customer table, consider a scenario that one customer has more than 1 account with the bank. So, our table will look something like below -

Customer_ID	Customer_Name	Account_Number	Account_Type	Balance_Amount
Cust100	John Taylor	Acc100	Savings	60000
Cust101	David Williams	Acc101	Current	50000
Cust102	Tracy Smith	Acc 102	Savings	55000
Cust103	Emma Jones	Acc103		52000
Cust100	John Taylor	Acc104	Car Loan	100000
Cust101	David Williams	Acc105	Savings	40000

In this case if we execute the below SQL Query -

Select * from Customer where Customer_ID = ‘Cust100’

Then it will return 2 rows. So now, the Customer_ID column is not sufficient to uniquely identify the row in the table. In such case, if we consider Customer_ID + Account_Number then it will uniquely identify a row in the table. So, Customer_ID + Account_Number cumulative becomes the Primary key of the Customer table. This is called Composite Primary key.

With a Composite key, a table can be created as below -

CREATE TABLE Customer (

Customer_ID varchar(10),

Customer_Name varchar(40) NOT NULL,

Account_Number varchar(10),

Account_Type varchar(20),

Balance_Amount int,

PRIMARY KEY (Customer_ID, Account_Number),

FOREIGN KEY (Account_Type) REFERENCES Accounts(Account_Type)

);

So, this was the basic database walkthrough with details on Join and Union.

The next article in the series is “Basic SQL commands” which you must know if you are planning to start your Data Science journey.

You can comment on the blog if you want details on any other topic of Database or Data Science. I can create a blog on that as well.

Cloud Computing Use Cases

2020-07-19T05:38:00.003+05:30

Since last few years, Cloud Computing has gained lots of popularity. It has been adopted by IT companies across different industries. Organisations dealing with big data, data science and machine learning have also adopted Cloud Computing due to its infrastructural & other benefits. That's the reason why most of the people now are focusing towards growing their career in cloud computing.

Most of the people who are completely new to cloud computing - start their cloud journey by directly learning cloud services of any cloud provider.

Even after learning the services, when they attempt to solve scenario-based problems, they are mostly unable to do so. Do you know why?

Because they don't even understand the scenario. They don't understand what is the real problem for which they need to provide the solution.

Because they have not followed the optimized way to learn cloud computing. Would you like to know what is the most optimized path for cloud journey?

Get a free copy of the course "Practical Implementation of Cloud Computing in IT Businesses" on Udemy using the coupon code

You can directly start learning any of the cloud provider services, if you have below understanding-

architectural-level understanding of software application development
understanding of the various Use Cases where Cloud Computing can provide benefits

But if you have not worked on the architectural aspects of software application development , then you should follow below path -

first understand the cloud computing concepts
next, understand what are different Use Cases where Cloud Computing can be helpful for better performance, scalability, availability and other non-functional requirements of the application. Understand that what problem areas are solved by adopting cloud services in a given scenario.
once you have understood the problem areas where cloud computing can be helpful, then you can pick up any cloud provider and learn its services.

Most of the people who don't have architectural background, when they directly learn cloud services and try to solve scenario-based problem, they go back to spend time in understanding the Cloud Computing Use Cases and its impact on the application architecture. That's why their learning path becomes more time-consuming.

So, understanding Cloud Computing Use Cases is very important. This knowledge can help you to solve the scenario-based problems more effectively and you can optimize your cloud journey in less time.

Get a free copy of the course on Udemy using the coupon code

"Practical Implementation of Cloud Computing in IT Businesses" course on Udemy is for those who wants to become Cloud Architect. If you want to become Cloud Expert, this course will give you a transformational experience.

You will learn -
1. How to take architectural decisions leveraging cloud computing.
2. How to grow career in Cloud related work in IT?
3. What is future of Cloud Computing?
4. How Large IT organizations are using Cloud Computing?
5. How Small online business and Start-ups can use Cloud Computing to grow their businesses?

You can get a free copy of the course on Udemy using the coupon code.

This is a to-the-point and a crisp course. The couple of hours spent on this course will help you save many hours when you will learn any cloud service.

So, go ahead and grab the FREE copy of the Udemy course and optimize your cloud learning journey.

Are You Learning The Right Way

2020-06-05T04:49:00.002+05:30

Are you planning for learning a new skill or doing a certification? Check if your learning path is optimized to give you the maximum benefit of your hard work and time which you will spend in learning the new skill.

Read the article Are You Learning the Right Way on LinkedIn by me. This will give you a
perspective that what should be the right path of learning. You can check your learning path to ensure that you are learning in an efficient way.

If you need any help in getting career counselling or understanding which learning path is more suitable for you, you can Contact Us and join our Closed Facebook Group and ask your queries. We discuss new technology trends and architectural aspects of various niche technologies on the ArchitectureSimplified - Closed Facebook Group.

Training Offerings

2020-04-23T04:24:00.002+05:30

ArchitectureSimplified Training Offerings

ArchitectureSimplified provides training on Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud and Google Cloud Platform (GCP).

ArchitectureSimplified has designed various courses depending on different level of Cloud understanding of audience -

Absolute Beginner to Cloud

If you are completely new to Cloud, this course is for you. Architecture Simplified provides free training on Cloud Computing. Look into the space to get more details of FREE Cloud Computing training.

New to AWS Cloud

If you have basic Cloud Computing understanding and want to explore Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud so that you can start taking up AWS Cloud assignments at work, then "AWS Foundation Course" is apt for you.

AWS Solution Architect Exam Aspirant

If you have basic understanding of AWS Cloud and aspire to become AWS Solution Architect certified, then "AWS Advanced Architecture Course for Solution Architect Exam" course will be a great help for you. If you aspire for AWS Certification Exam, you must understand
what is the exam pattern. More details to get the right answer for AWS Exam is mentioned in Looking for Cloud Certification article. This knowledge will not only help you clear the exam but also when you have to find solution for real-time Cloud related scenarios, then also this knowledge will be very helpful.

New to Google Cloud Platform

If you have basic Cloud Computing understanding and want to explore Google Cloud Platform (GCP) services so that you can start taking up GCP Cloud assignments at work, then "GCP Foundation Course" is a good choice for you.

Google Cloud - Professional Cloud Architect

If you have basic understanding of Google Cloud Platform services and aspire to become Google Cloud - Professional Cloud Architect certified, then "GCP Advanced Architecture Course for Professional Architect Exam" course will be a great help for you. If you aspire for GCP Certification Exam, you must understand what is the exam pattern. More details to get the right answer for GCP certification exam is mentioned in Looking for Cloud Certification article. This knowledge will not only help you clear the exam but also when you have to find solution for real-time Cloud related scenarios, then also this knowledge will be very helpful.

Attend Free Cloud Computing Training Online || ArchitectureSimplified

2020-03-17T20:03:00.001+05:30

Enhance Skills || Attend Free Online Cloud Computing training

Corona Virus!!! Offices are closed or provided Work From Home! Can't go anywhere out for a vacation! Want to avoid going to public places. Not sure what to do in this case??

This is the time which you can utilize in learning new technologies. Are you still thinking that Why spend time in learning new technologies ??

Are you new to Cloud Computing?? Or, preparing for any of the Cloud Computing certification??
So, here is the opportunity - ArchitectureSimplified provides training on Cloud Computing for FREE online.

Cloud Computing is adopted by all the organizations. Even if you are working as a Web Developer or a Data Engineer or performing any other role, you need to have basic understanding of Cloud Computing. Depending on the role you are performing, the expectation of Cloud Computing proficiency can vary. But you should definitely have basic understanding of Cloud Computing.

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Register for FREE Cloud Computing Course. Fill in all the details in the Registration Form then you will receive an email with all the details of joining the Cloud Computing course online.

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Check our Specialized Courses to complete AWS Solution Architect or GCP - Professional Cloud Architect certification. Keep reading our Blogs to get more updates on technology trends and services provided by ArchitectureSimplified.

Looking for Cloud Certification || AWS Certification?? || Google Cloud Certification??

2020-03-03T05:23:00.003+05:30

Looking for Cloud Certification ||

AWS Certification?? || Google Cloud Certification??

Still thinking that why it is important to upgrade in new technologies?? Refer the article Why Upgrading in New Technologies So Important Now?

Organizations are moving towards Cloud adoption. There are many Cloud providers but AWS (Amazon Web Services), GCP (Google Cloud Platform) and Azure are among the top choices, in terms of services used across organizations. If you want to build your career in Cloud, you need to start ASAP. It's been few years when organizations started transforming their digital journey to the Cloud. There are still many organizations which are still on their way to cloud adoption. So, this is the right time to take a step towards Cloud, if you have not taken so far.

I completed below Cloud certifications -

AWS Solution Architect certification in Jan-2019
Google Cloud - Professional Cloud Architect certification in Jan-2020

Based on my experience, I am sharing the pointers which may help you in completing the AWS / GCP certification. If you are looking for any of the certification then it is very important that you understand below points -

1. AWS / GCP services and its key features - based on the certification you are targeting, you need to understand that Cloud's services. If you have understood key features of AWS / GCP services, you will be able to remove 1 or 2 incorrect options from the given choices for each question in the certification exam.

2. When to use which service - this is where you need to understand the use cases for each service. if you have understood major use cases for each service, you will be either able to figure out the correct option for the question or will have reduced the possible choices.

3. Read the question carefully - this is the most important part of finding the correct option from the given choices for each question. This is because there will be few key words in question that will help you to reach to the correct option, for example - "Cost-effective solution", "High Availability", "Disaster Recovery", "RTO/RPO", "Real-time", "Batch processing" and many more such key words. There might be more than 1 choices given in the question which will appear correct to you, that's where you need to understand these key words, as based on its distinguishing feature, you will reach to the correct answer.

If you are preparing for AWS or GCP certification or planning to do so, here is how I can help you with.

I will frequently publish articles on my blog on ArchitectureSimplified that will help you in completing AWS and GCP certifications, so subscribe to the blog and follow on LinkedIn and join Telegram group to read new articles. These articles will mainly focus on pointers #2 & 3.

If you have any doubt in particular services of AWS and GCP, comment below and mention your pain areas, so that I can help you with the solution and will create an article to address your problem.

If you are newbie to the Cloud world, comment below. We have a private playlist on YouTube to cover Cloud Computing concepts that will help you to ease your Cloud understanding. If you need access, join the Telegram GCP Study Group and connect with admin to get the access.

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Role of a Data Engineer

2020-02-05T04:10:00.003+05:30

Role of a Data Engineer

a Data Engineer is to build data pipelines. Data engineers build data pipelines so that the data can be used for below purposes -

displaying data in the form of chart & graphs on dashboard to get quick insights
generating reports for management to take decisions
generating Machine Learning model for businesses to make data-driven decisions.

Data in the current world comes from many sources like web pages, applications' databases, social media, files, videos, images etc. The data is in different formats.
The traditional data which was from application's transactions - that was Structured data as it was schema-based. But along with that we have Semi-structured and huge Unstructred data. So, the data coming from different sources and different types need to be stored accordingly. Data Lake is used to store the data from various sources. But choosing the right Data Lake is also an important task. There are many factors which determine which Data Lake you should consider for given scenario. For example, is the data lake supporting the data type which you are planning to store in it? Also, since the data is increasing in size, is your Data Lake capable enough of handing change in demand, etc.

The data which comes from these sources can't be used directly as it may contain duplicates, null values, outliers etc. The data needs to cleaned-up before it can be used further for generating reports or Machine Learning models. This process is called Data Wrangling.

Next the data needs to be processed so that it can be used for the purposes mentioned above. Once the data is transformed then it is ready to be used as an input for generating reports or ML models. There are various tools used to display the data in the form of charts & graphs like Tableau, using Python libraries like Scikit, Matplotlib etc.

Since data is generated enormously in today's world which is used to get insights useful for businesses to take decisions, predicting the behavior and there are many more use cases for it, so the role of Data Engineers has definitely become very important now.

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Changes in Oracle Java SE Release Process - POV

2019-09-12T15:04:00.003+05:30

Changes in Oracle Java SE Release Process - POV

Some time back Oracle announced significant changes in the way Java SE versions will be released and the public support changes which is provided by Oracle. Also, there are changes in the way new Java SE releases are named. This POV highlights those points so that applications and developers may have good understanding on these aspects.

Before proceeding, let's understand why there is a need to upgrade to latest version of any software which we are using. In every upgraded version of software, some new features or some modifications to existing features or some security patches of latest identified vulnerabilities are included. If we don't migrate our applications to latest version of software, we will not only lose the opportunity to use new or modified features but our applications will become more vulnerable as it will not have the security patches to safeguard our application towards new security threats. So, the software vendors keep providing software patches time to time to meet the above needs.
Now, if there is a scenario where software vendors are not providing the s/w release support in the form of security patches to public for free, then we will have to pay if we are using the software. There is another scenario that s/w vendors are providing patches to public for a limited time, then what should be the approach. This is what we will understand in the POV in terms of Java SE releases by Oracle.

Earlier releases of JDK were based on the features they were containing. Sometimes there was a delay in time to market as Oracle had to wait to get the features available before it can be bundled in that release and time to market for such releases used to get extended. So, Oracle has now moved from feature-driven model to schedule based model. In the schedule-based model the Java SE JDK release-roadmap is already created and the releases will be based on these timelines only by bundling features that are available by then.

In the Schedule-based model there are two main types of releases - feature Release - these are the releases which are planned to be released every six months and Oracle will provide the public support during these 6 months. The six monthly releases are planned every March and September in a year.

There is another important release which is Long Term Support (LTS) release. These releases will be available every three years.

There is change in the way releases are named as well. Earlier the release names were incremental like JDK 1.5, JDK 1.6 etc. But since now the releases are time bound so the naming conventions of the releases will be like year.month, ie, 18.3 if JDK is released on March 2018 and so on.

The projects and developers who are upgrading latest version of Java every six months, there is no impact on them as Oracle will provide support for each new release for the next six months.
But there are many application that use Java and they don't want to upgrade Java every six months, so they should plan to upgrade to Long Term Supported version of Java if they are not looking for frequent changes.
There are many third party vendors who provide LTS. So, there are few things applications should plan for -
1. Considering migrating their application to Long Term supported version of JDK which is JDK 11 (JDK 18.9) as of date.
2. Look out for the vendor options that can provide LTS for Oracle JDK.

Though Oracle has announced changes in the way JDK will be released and public support of it, but if we understand the impact and plan the upgrade to either to six-monthly release or Long-Term-Supported version of Java, our applications will be protected.

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Why Upgrading in New Technologies So Important Now?

2019-08-02T20:37:00.003+05:30

Why Upgrading in New Technologies So Important Now?

I started my career in IT industry in 2001. The technology on which I was working that time, soon became obsolete. I learnt new technology which existed for a very long time. Though few changes were added to it, but it was easier to learn those changes and implement. I noticed that once people were expert in those technologies in 2-3 years of time, they were quite comfortable and continued with the same technologies for a long time. Not much learning was there.

But the scenario has changed over the period of time. Mostly from the year 2012, many new technologies emerged and were in use like DevOps, AWS Cloud Computing, Big Data etc. In the last few years, few more technologies got added in the list like Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, Robotics Process Automation, Google Cloud, Data Science etc.

You don't have to learn these new technologies to just stay on top of the crowd, rather the scenario here is that if you don't upgrade yourself now, it will be very late. Possibly, you might be out of the industry as well. Few of these technologies are not even "Good to Have", those have become "Must Have". For example, Cloud Computing is no more a niche. It's a mandate now as many applications are now moving to Cloud and using some or other Cloud services.

So, don't wait further and upgrade yourself in couple of these new technologies to remain updated and understand how the industry is progressing further.