"Free" is listed everywhere, but realistically there is nothing that you can do on a t2.micro (free) instance (unless you're trying to create a "Raspberry Pi in the sky"). To launch a true minimal Linux host, with 8GB of RAM, you're looking at $65 dollars/month PLUS storage costs (S3 + EBS) whereas you can get the same at Digital Ocean for around $30/month.
== Containers ==
== ECS ==
[[Docker]] offerings at AWS
== EKS ==
[[Kubernetes]] offerings at AWS
== Fargate ==
Fargate is a [https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/architecture/ten-things-serverless-architects-should-know/ serverless architecture] for running 'tasks' on the ECS platform. [https://aws.amazon.com/architecture/this-is-my-architecture/? Customer profiles] "this is my architecture"
== Lambda ==
AWS Lambda is akin to the 'entrypoint' script of a docker container. It's a function (or program) that can run independently of any hardware via an event trigger. For event-driven architectures it can be useful to have such capabilities. For instance, if we have a video website (e.g. YouTube) and we need to transcode new uploads, that transcoding is a one-time process triggered each time a user uploads a new source video. Another example would be to decouple [https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/compute/resize-images-on-the-fly-with-amazon-s3-aws-lambda-and-amazon-api-gateway/ image resizing] from image uploading.
==Free Software alternatives==
Any Solutions Architect with credibility is going to acknowledge that the giants of proprietary software solutions have built their empires on the backs of Free Software. But the product offerings have grown like weeds in a garden, so it can be hard to distinguish the original crop. What solutions or equivalents exist?
=== Cloud Computing Platforms ===
The '''[[:en:OpenStack|OpenStack]]''' platform was started by RackSpace and NASA and is a free, open standard cloud computing platform. The March 2023 release included 41 services.
===Cloud Provider Alternatives===
For specific needs, there are sometimes niche vendors that offer a more attractive proposition. https://www.websiteplanet.com/blog/aws-alternatives/ lists alternatives such as Digital Ocean, Kamatera, LiquidWeb and Cloudways if all you really need is a web host or routine solutions.
==Links==
[[Category:System Architecture]]
[[Category:AWS]]
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