AWS Application Discovery Service

AWS Application Discovery Service

  • AWS Application Discovery Service helps plan migration to the AWS cloud by collecting usage and configuration data about the on-premises servers.
  • helps enterprises obtain a snapshot of the current state of their data center servers by collecting server specification information, hardware configuration, performance data, details of running processes, and network connections
  • is integrated with AWS Migration Hub,
    • which simplifies migration tracking as it aggregates migration status information into a single console.
    • can help view the discovered servers, group them into applications, and then track the migration status of each application.
  • discovered data for all the regions is stored in the AWS Migration Hub home Region.
  • The data can be exported for analysis in Microsoft Excel or AWS analysis tools such as Amazon Athena and Amazon QuickSight.
  • supports both agent and agentless-based on-premises tooling, in addition to file-based import for performing discovery and collecting data about the on-premises servers.

Application Discovery Service Modes

Agentless discovery

  • is an on-premises application that collects information through agentless methods.
  • can be performed by deploying the Agentless Collector (OVA file) through the VMware vCenter.
  • After Agentless Collector is configured,
    • it identifies VMs and hosts associated with vCenter.
    • collects the following static configuration data: Server hostnames, IP addresses, MAC addresses, and disk resource allocations.
    • Additionally, it collects the utilization data for each VM and computes average and peak utilization for metrics such as CPU, RAM, and Disk I/O.

Agent-based discovery

  • can be performed by deploying the Application Discovery Agent on each of the VMs and physical servers.
  • supports most Windows and Linux operating systems.
  • can be deployed on physical on-premises servers, EC2 instances, and virtual machines.
  • collects static configuration data, detailed time-series system-performance information, inbound and outbound network connections, and processes that are running.
  • pings the Discovery Service at 15-minute intervals for configuration information.
  • transmits data securely to the Discovery Service using TLS encryption.

AWS Application Discovery Service Agentless vs Agent

AWS Certification Exam Practice Questions

  • Questions are collected from Internet and the answers are marked as per my knowledge and understanding (which might differ with yours).
  • AWS services are updated everyday and both the answers and questions might be outdated soon, so research accordingly.
  • AWS exam questions are not updated to keep up the pace with AWS updates, so even if the underlying feature has changed the question might not be updated
  • Open to further feedback, discussion and correction.
  1. A company is migrating its on-premises systems to AWS. The user environment consists of the following systems:
    • Windows and Linux virtual machines running on VMware.
    • Physical servers running Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
    The company wants to be able to perform the following steps before migrating to AWS:
    • Identify dependencies between on-premises systems.
    • Group systems together into applications to build migration plans.
    How can these requirements be met?
    1. Install the AWS Systems Manager Discovery Agent on each of the on-premises systems.
    2. Install the AWS Application Discovery Service Discovery Agent on each of the on-premises systems.
    3. Install the AWS Application Discovery Service Discovery Connector on each of the on-premises systems and in VMware vCenter.
    4. Install the AWS Application Discovery Service Discovery Agent on the physical on-premises servers. Install the AWS Application Discovery Service Discovery Connector in VMware vCenter.

References