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AWS Services Quick Reference

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AWS Services Quick Reference

The definitive quick-reference for AWS's sprawling service catalog. This pack distills 50+ AWS services into scannable one-page summaries covering what each service does, when to use it, key configuration options, pricing model, and common pitfalls. Stop tab-switching between AWS docs — keep this on your desk and find the right service in seconds.

What's Included

  • Compute Services — EC2, Lambda, ECS, EKS, Fargate, Lightsail, Batch, App Runner
  • Storage Services — S3, EBS, EFS, FSx, Storage Gateway, Glacier
  • Database Services — RDS, DynamoDB, ElastiCache, Neptune, Redshift, Aurora, DocumentDB
  • Networking — VPC, Route 53, CloudFront, API Gateway, ELB/ALB/NLB, Transit Gateway
  • Security & Identity — IAM, KMS, Secrets Manager, WAF, Shield, GuardDuty, Cognito
  • ML & Analytics — SageMaker, Bedrock, Athena, Glue, Kinesis, QuickSight
  • DevOps & Management — CloudFormation, CloudWatch, Systems Manager, CodePipeline
  • Comparison Charts — Storage tiers, database types, compute pricing models

Preview / Sample Content

Lambda vs EC2 vs Fargate — When to Use What 

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ DECISION: Where should this workload run?                       │
├──────────────┬──────────────────┬───────────────────────────────┤
│ Duration     │ < 15 minutes     │ Lambda                        │
│              │ Long-running     │ EC2 or Fargate                │
├──────────────┼──────────────────┼───────────────────────────────┤
│ Traffic      │ Spiky / Bursty   │ Lambda or Fargate             │
│              │ Steady-state     │ EC2 (Reserved/Savings Plan)   │
├──────────────┼──────────────────┼───────────────────────────────┤
│ State        │ Stateless        │ Lambda or Fargate             │
│              │ Stateful         │ EC2 with EBS                  │
├──────────────┼──────────────────┼───────────────────────────────┤
│ Container?   │ Yes              │ Fargate (serverless) or ECS   │
│              │ No               │ Lambda or EC2                 │
└──────────────┴──────────────────┴───────────────────────────────┘
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S3 Storage Classes at a Glance 

S3 Standard          → Frequently accessed, < 1ms latency
S3 Intelligent-Tier  → Unknown/changing access patterns, auto-tiering
S3 Standard-IA       → Infrequent access, min 30-day storage, retrieval fee
S3 One Zone-IA       → Same as IA but single AZ (non-critical reproducible data)
S3 Glacier Instant   → Archive with millisecond retrieval
S3 Glacier Flexible  → Archive, 1-5 min (expedited) to 5-12 hr retrieval
S3 Glacier Deep      → Cheapest, 12-48 hr retrieval, 180-day minimum
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IAM Policy Essentials 

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "s3:GetObject",
        "s3:PutObject"
      ],
      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::my-bucket/*",
      "Condition": {
        "IpAddress": {
          "aws:SourceIp": "10.0.0.0/8"
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}
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Key IAM rules:

  • Default deny — everything is denied unless explicitly allowed
  • Explicit deny always wins over any allow
  • Use Condition keys to restrict by IP, MFA, time, tags
  • Prefer managed policies over inline policies
  • Never attach policies directly to users — use groups or roles

Quick Reference Table

Service Category Use When... Pricing Model
EC2 Compute Need full OS control, GPU, steady workloads Per-hour/second
Lambda Compute Event-driven, < 15 min, spiky traffic Per-invocation + duration
S3 Storage Object storage, static hosting, data lake Per-GB + requests
RDS Database Relational data, need managed Postgres/MySQL Per-hour + storage
DynamoDB Database Key-value, < 10ms latency, auto-scaling Per-RCU/WCU or on-demand
CloudFront CDN Global content delivery, edge caching Per-GB transfer + requests
Route 53 DNS DNS hosting, health checks, routing policies Per-hosted-zone + queries
SQS Messaging Decouple services, async processing Per-million requests
SNS Messaging Fan-out notifications, pub/sub Per-million publishes
EKS Containers Kubernetes orchestration at scale Cluster fee + compute
Cognito Auth User sign-up/sign-in, OAuth, SAML Per-MAU (free tier: 50k)
CloudWatch Monitoring Logs, metrics, alarms, dashboards Per-metric + log ingestion

Usage Tips

  1. Start with the decision trees — Don't memorize services. Use the flowcharts to match your workload to the right service.
  2. Check the pricing gotchas — Each service page lists hidden costs (data transfer, API calls, minimum storage durations).
  3. Use the comparison charts for architectural decisions — they save hours of doc-reading.
  4. Pin the IAM reference — Every AWS project starts with getting permissions right.
  5. Cross-reference with the networking sheet — VPC design affects every other service's performance and cost.

Comparison: Managed Database Services

Feature RDS Aurora DynamoDB ElastiCache Redshift
Type Relational Relational Key-Value/Doc In-Memory Columnar
SQL Full SQL Full SQL PartiQL None Full SQL
Max Storage 64 TB 128 TB Unlimited 340 GB/node 2 PB
Replication Multi-AZ Multi-AZ + Global Global Tables Cluster Mode RA3 nodes
Serverless No Aurora Serverless v2 On-Demand mode No Serverless
Best For OLTP apps High-perf OLTP Web/mobile scale Caching/sessions Analytics/OLAP

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