About AWS Certified Database - Specialty Exam
The AWS Certified Database – Specialty certification exam by code DBS-C01 is a greatly rewarding way of testing your knowledge and skills as regards achieving the optimal AWS database solutions. In other words, this AWS exam tests your technical knowledge of how to improve performance, mitigate costs, and yield innovations for yourself and your organization, particularly, through your display of expertise in recommending, designing, and maintaining AWS database services.
Audience and Prerequisites
It is important to note that the AWS Certified Database – Specialty certification test is precisely meant for self-motivated individuals who are practitioners of certain technical roles involving, for instance, Data Platform Engineers, Database Administrators, Solutions Architects as well as other related jobs. What is more, this AWS exam is specially prepared for candidates who already have a recommended level of knowledge and experience in complex database processes as well as AWS services. To be specific, intending candidates must have worked with general database technologies for a minimum of 5 years and worked on AWS analysis solutions for 2 years and more.
Important Exam Details to Note
Available in the English, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean languages, this 180-minute exam involves a total of 65 questions which could come in both multiple-choice and multiple-response format. As for the multiple-choice questions, in particular, there will be a variety of four options from which candidates will be expected to pick one right answer. And concerning the multiple-response type, on the other hand, there will be a list of five possible answers from which candidates have to choose two or more correct responses. Thus, to successfully pass this official test you need to score a minimum of 750 out of 1000 total points. Regarding delivery, the DBS-C01 test can be taken via either of two delivery means such as passing in the authorized testing center and as an online proctored exam. In any case, each candidate must pay a registration fee of $300. In addition, there is also the availability of a practice test the enrollment for which costs $40.
Domains of AWS DBS-C01 Exam
The first thing that you as a candidate have to be familiar with is the exam domains and the various topics from which the test questions will be picked. You should note that these domains have a certain percentage of the whole exam content attached to them so you may understand the breakdown and strategize your preparation effectively towards passing well. All in all, in the actual test, you’ll encounter the concepts from the following tested areas:
- Workload-Specific Database Design (26%)
In this domain, candidates are expected to be able to make use of the right database services for different types of workloads and data. Apart from these, applicants must also know how to develop the best strategies to achieve high availability and disaster recovery, as well as build the most effective database solutions for not only performance and compliance but also scalability. Furthermore, you should demonstrate your understanding of the difference between the various database solutions costs and adequately compare them.
- Migration and Deployment (20%)
This question area generally focuses on candidates' understanding of the ways to deploy database solutions effectively. By the same token, candidates need to know the best means of preparing data to migrate it appropriately, plus they must be able to validate and execute data migration with excellence and ease.
- Operations and Management (18%)
According to this test part, all applicants have to demonstrate the skill set related to management processes and tasks, as well as restore and backup strategies. In addition to all these, you should be able to perform the management of the operational environment for varied database solutions.
- Troubleshooting and Monitoring (18%)
This knowledge area is where candidates must prove their level of problem-solving and security skills, especially in relation to the determination of effective strategies regarding alerting and monitoring, as well as database performance optimization. After that, every applicant should validate his or her ability to resolve common issues through the troubleshooting process.
- Database Security (18%)
As you already understand, the last exam domain is related to the security of databases. Therefore, here, the candidates are most especially tested on their level of knowledge with regard to ensuring database security, in terms of the encryption of data either at rest or in motion, and the evaluation of auditing solutions. Moreover, you should have a deep understanding of authentication mechanisms and access control, in parallel with possible security vulnerabilities that may affect database solutions.
Career Opportunities
Passing the AWS DBS-C01 exam and earning the AWS Certified Database – Specialty qualification automatically positions you as valid and credible, especially due to the preeminent international reputation that this certificate has. At the same time, with this well-known designation, you easily put yourself and your organization up for huge opportunities and growth rate, since you must have been armed with the necessary knowledge and skills in deploying AWS services in formulating database solutions. This also tells you that good income raise plus increased confidence is assured with the attainment of this designation. For example, this certificate can qualify you for the roles of a Database Engineer, Data Architect, Senior Database Cloud Security Administrator, Data Platform Engineer, Senior Data Engineer, and the like, which all come with a huge paycheck. To illustrate this, a Database Engineer can get more than $92k annually while a Data Architect can ask for as much as $121k as a median salary as rendered by Payscale. After all, one way or another, many leading IT companies value certified specialists and offer them generous remuneration. Especially those who have such certification as the AWS Certified Database - Specialty.
Certification Path
If you want to further augment your knowledge within the AWS Specialty track, then you should mull over their other designations like the AWS Certified Advanced Networking - Specialty or the AWS Certified Security - Specialty, and so on. Besides, you can explore the AWS professional-level path and opt for such validations as the AWS Certified DevOps Engineer - Professional and the AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Professional.
