Video: AWS DynamoDB Tutorial for Beginners

Notes:

DynamoDB

NoSQL Database optimized for performance at scale
Key-value lookup stores
Distributes data across different partitions (machines, physical or virtual)
Total managed AWS Service
Can scale out horizontally by adding more nodes onto the cluster and separating data into clusters
Even as data grows, performance does not slow down
High Availability & Durability
Will store multiple copies of data across multiple nodes
Ideal for applications with known access patterns
Concern: need to know how you want to access your data
What is our access pattern?
Access through APIs / Object Relational Mappers and authorized through IAM
ORMS
Java: Dynamo Mapper
Python: Modal 3
Everything is managed through IAM - need user with correct permissions to access specific API
Integrates well with other AWS services
Cost effective usage based payment model

Core Concepts - Tables, Items, Attributes, Indexes

Tables are a collection of items
Items are collections of Attributes, or key / value pairs
Every Row is an item - collections of attributes or key value pairs
Attribute is a column - one specific characteristic for each item
Primary key: partition key and sort key
Can't have any duplicates of a partition key with a sort key
Sort key allows you to do range-like operation
Attribute: Strings, booleans, lists, etc.
Indexes:
Global secondary index (GSI): instead of querying in just partition and sort key, you can query on any column
Make it more efficient to access our data

Dynamo DB Console

AWS Management Console > DynamoDB > Create table
Tables are region specific - make sure you are in the right region
Create partition and sort key
Sort key cannot be changed or added later
Does your data set require your partition key to be duplicated
Customize Settings
On Demand Capacity: pays for actual reads and writes that are performed
Provisioned Capacity: manage and optimize costs by allocating read/write capacity in advance
More cost effective for predictable traffic
Secondary indexes:
Local indexes can only be created at time of table creation
Allows us to query based on range like attributes
GSIs from above
Can be added at any time
Cost implications of using GSIs

Dynamo DB Tabs

Monitor tab: shows info about dataset
Global tables: can have multiple representations of the same table across multiple regions
Backups tab:
PITR: provides continuous backups of data for 35 days, allows you to do equivalent of windows system restore
On-demand backups
Exports and Streams
Additional Settings
Can change read and write capacity
Time to Live: need to say what column name you want to run it on
Encryption
Tags

Table