Table of Contents
Introduction
Books are a great way to gain knowledge on Amazon Web Services (AWS) alongside visually immersive modules and courses, but they provide deep understanding and extensive knowledge on the various components of AWS and the complementary skills that are required. The best AWS books cover the foundation of AWS and contribute majorly to the development of an individual as an expert in AWS and AWS integrations.
What is AWS?
AWS or Amazon Web Service is one of the most popular cloud computing platforms available in the modern era. AWS is highly secure and offers services that range from computing, database storing and data analytics to platforming content delivery and other features which power the technology and software or cloud infrastructures of companies.
Companies use AWS for various applications like application and website hosting, media sharing, search engine utilisation, database storage, backup and failure recovering. Many top corporations such as Pinterest, Dropbox, Netflix and Instagram utilise AWS.
As of 2021, AWS offers more than 100 cloud and web-based services such as Elastic Compute Cloud, AWS Lambda, Elastic beanstalk and LightSail.
What are the Benefits of Using AWS?
AWS provides many services to corporations and allows them to function smoothly depending on the benefits AWS offers to these organisations. Here are the various benefits of integrating AWS:
1. AWS is easy to use: AWS is very easy to use and can be used to rapidly host applications such as SaaS applications while keeping it secure. One can use AWS Management Console and various APIs to use Amazon’s very own application hosting platform.
2. AWS is versatile: AWS is very adaptive and flexible. It supports various operating systems, programming languages, databases and web application platforms that suit various needs or companies. AWS provides a virtual environment that allows us to load multiple software and services companies require. AWS also enables easier migration of older applications while prioritising modern solutions.
3. AWS is cheaper and a more cost-effective solution: AWS allows individuals or companies to only pay for the computing power, storage and resources that have been used. Beneficiaries of AWS enjoy personalised plans. Users do not need to uphold any long-term contracts or commitments.
4. AWS is stable and scalable: AWS is reliable and very secure as well. It is highly scalable with a very secure networking architecture in place. Using AWS tools such as Auto Scaling, Elastic Load Balancing and applications can be scaled up or down as per the requirement with ease.
5. Security and Integrity: AWS uses end-to-end approaches for security purposes and hardens infrastructural liabilities.
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Top 10 AWS Books for Beginners and Advanced Programmers
There are many globally recognised and highly acclaimed books that are published to help budding developers and even professionals in this field. Here are some of the best AWS books available in paperback and digital print:
1. Implementing Cloud Design Patterns for AWS By Marcus Young
- Implementing Cloud Design Pattern for AWS explores Amazon’s web services in strategic ways to provide solutions to many daily problems.
- This book contains expansive knowledge about dynamic and static data as well as the patterns in which the data is uploaded.
- The book focuses on backups by covering the subjects of backup maintenance and backup storage.
- This book has valuable information about handling redundancy which goes a long way to support budding programmers.
- AWS Lambda is a serverless computing platform and is one of the most integral parts of Amazon Web Services.
- It is a computing service running on code and driven by events. Programming AWS Lambda is an invaluable book which talks about AWS Lambda and how it integrates the serverless complementary services of AWS such as DynamoDB.
- This book assists both budding and professional users of AWS Lambda and covers the concepts rather than simply focus on the code.
- There are many exercises and examples given in the book involving the use of Java, XLM, etc. and other services.
- This book provides incredible advice for building applications that are stable while decreasing cost and maintaining performance.
3. Amazon Web Services For Dummies By Bernard Golden
- Amazon Web Services is a great book for beginners and budding developers and covers the fundamentals of AWS from the scratch.
- This book takes an interesting and fun approach to the concepts involved in the implementation of AWS and covers the core principles of AWS.
- This book is initially a bit theoretical and explains cloud and applications and computing concepts.
4. AWS Automation Cookbook By Nikit Swaraj
- This book covers the various aspects of automating application pipelines which help organizations get more versatile and efficient.
- AWS Automation Cookbook covers topics such as AWS CodeDeploy, AWS CodeBuild and CodePipeline which are surfaces known for their scalability.
- These services are offered by AWS to automate an application’s build and deployment pipelines.
- This book covers a range of concepts that enables developers to have full control over software development and allows the minimising of application downtime through the implementation of CI/CD.
- This is a great read for architects, administrators and developers.
- This book is more focused on certification and examinations.
- The chapters are well orchestrated with well-defined explanations and insights.
- This book works as a really solid study material to learn the core principles of AWS and networking as well as clear AWS certification examinations.
- It is one of the best AWS books that have an enormously beneficial effect on tests due to containing multiple exercises after every topic.
6. AWS: Amazon Web Services, the Ultimate Guide for Beginners to Advanced By Maverick Koston
- AWS: Amazon Web Services, the Ultimate Guide for Beginners to Advanced is one of the best AWS books available that cover various IT operations and real-world examples.
- It is a generously fed book filled with information that helps individuals with various degrees of experience to extract more value out of AWS to enable better performance and security.
- This book is not as technical as the others in this list and is much easier to grasp for beginners.
7. Machine Learning in the AWS Cloud By Abhishek Mishra
- This book covers the involvement of Machine Learning (ML) in AWS and provides various real-world examples to come up with solutions for regression and classification.
- Machine Learning in the AWS Cloud introduces readers to the foundations of cloud computing and various AWS machine learning implementations in the cloud.
- This book covers Amazon Machine Learning and Amazon SageMaker and teaches individuals how to provide practical solutions for complex problems.
8. Amazon Web Services in Action By Andreas Wittig and Michael Wittig
- This is one of the best AWS books, which is armed with updated knowledge of the latest upgrades in AWS.
- This book covers automation and infrastructural designing using AWS Lambda.
- It teaches users to share data volumes between systems by utilising EFS.
- This book also covers topics such as creating data caches in memory with the help of Elasticache and other topics centring around various other services.
9. Learning Amazon Web Services (AWS) By Mark Wilkins
- Learning Amazon Web Services (AWS) provides amazing resources for the planning and deployment of AWS services.
- This is one of the best AWS books, which covers the operation and integrations of AWS to maximise security and versatility.
- This book takes a steady approach to AWS frameworks and gives the reader time to learn each important element that is involved in using AWS effectively.
10. Mastering AWS Security By Albert Anthony
- Mastering AWS Security is one of the best AWS books for professionals in this field, especially ones interested in AWS, cloud computing and networking.
- This book is mainly geared towards the security aspects of AWS and teaches readers how to secure workloads and databases.
- It proves to be very helpful for AWS architects and infrastructural specialists as well, creating a mature base to enable the creation and design of secure AWS environments.
- This book also covers auditing and how to efficiently audit workloads.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, big companies are growing more and more dependent on AWS to sustain their cloud infrastructures. There is also a high ROI or return on investment from AWS as it opens up new possibilities for higher income and it also helps individuals looking for jobs to get employed for desirable job roles.
Yes, a beginner can definitely learn AWS. AWS can be learnt by beginners by following step-by-step systematic learning methodologies which introduce various services and concepts of AWS to budding developers.
AWS is not at all difficult to learn. Yes, it is advised that the interested individuals should have strong foundations in computing and programming, but with enough interest in the field, even complete newcomers can learn the fundamentals of AWS with well-orchestrated study material which covers all the tools and skills required to work with AWS.
Yes, AWS has a lot of prospects and a bright future ahead with more corporations adopting Amazon’s services to power their technological needs. Skilled AWS experts are in high demand and can bag amazing jobs at many companies which incorporate AWS into their IT infrastructure or even at Amazon. AWS has a lot of potentials, and being able to work with AWS opens up many new opportunities or paths for programmers, administrators, managers and developers.
Similar to that of AWS, GCP offers world-class security and stability. It also provides multi-cloud support, Machine Learning and AI services which can be integrated with various open-source applications. However, AWS is more efficient, and maintaining AWS is much easier.
AWS offers services such as Elastic Compute Cloud, AWS Lambda, Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) and Amazon Connect. AWS has various services which assist networking, database management, analytics, development, storage and applications.
No. AWS does not require any advanced coding skills, most of its basic functionalities can be used without coding or scripting, but depending on the requirement or job role, one might need to learn to program. The AWS CLI and AWS SDK for Python, for instance, will require fundamental knowledge of Python as they use Python 2.7+ or 3.4+ as their Python runtime.
Yes, definitely. AWS certifications are highly valuable and verify the user’s eligibility and capability to work on the AWS platforms or take the responsibility of being involved in a corporation’s implementation of AWS.
Yes, AWS is used by many individuals for projects which are not large-scale. It is quite user-friendly and inexpensive, requiring less dedication and responsibility which makes it easy for smaller companies and individuals to adopt.
Yes, AWS is very stable and secure. AWS is known for the advanced security it offers. AWS has gotten its popularity from the advanced security features it offers.
Key Takeaway
AWS has an amazing future ahead, and it will grow even more massive than it already is. With serious development going on in AWS every year and thousands of skilled human assets involved with AWS, it is highly recommended that both beginners and veteran programmers invest their time in exploring AWS. Good books on AWS are a great way to step into the world of AWS and are a great start in the quest for knowledge regarding the services offered by Amazon’s state of the art technology.
