PAS-C01 Practice Exam 54 — 20 Questions

Question 1

A company is planning to migrate an SAP BusinessObjects environment to AWS. They need to ensure high availability for the Web Application Server tier. Which AWS service should they use to distribute traffic across multiple instances?

Choose an answer to begin — your selection is scored in the full session.

Accepted Answer

Application Load Balancer (ALB). An Application Load Balancer (ALB) distributes HTTP/HTTPS traffic across targets. NLB is for TCP/UDP. Global Accelerator improves performance but not primarily for load balancing. Route 53 is DNS.

Answer

AWS Global Accelerator

Answer

Network Load Balancer (NLB)

Answer

Amazon Route 53

Question 2

A company is running SAP on AWS and wants to ensure high availability for SAP Central Services (ASCS) and Enqueue Replication Server (ERS). Which architecture meets this requirement?

Accepted Answer

Deploy ASCS and ERS on separate EC2 instances in different Availability Zones, with a Network Load Balancer.. SAP Central Services (ASCS) and Enqueue Replication Server (ERS) must run on separate EC2 instances in different Availability Zones to achieve high availability. A Network Load Balancer (NLB) is used to distribute traffic and provide a single endpoint, while the enqueue replication mechanism (enrep) synchronizes the lock table between the two instances, enabling automatic failover without data loss.

Answer

Deploy ASCS and ERS on the same EC2 instance with S3 replication.

Answer

Configure Route 53 health checks to switch between two instances in the same AZ.

Answer

Use a single EC2 instance with an S3 bucket for shared storage and Lambda for failover.

Question 3

Which TWO actions should an operations team take to ensure high availability for SAP HANA in a single AWS Region?

Accepted Answer

Deploy SAP HANA in a Multi-AZ configuration using HANA System Replication.. Deploying SAP HANA in a Multi-AZ configuration using HANA System Replication ensures that a replica is maintained in a different Availability Zone, providing high availability across AZs. Option C is correct because HANA System Replication with automatic failover allows the system to automatically fail over to the replica if the primary fails, minimizing downtime. Option A is incorrect because read replicas are used for scaling read operations, not for high availability. Option D is incorrect because automated backups to Amazon S3 provide data protection but do not enable automatic failover. Option E is incorrect because a single EC2 instance in one AZ is a single point of failure and does not provide high availability.

Answer

Create read replicas of the HANA database.

Answer

Configure automated backups to Amazon S3.

Answer

Use a single large EC2 instance in one Availability Zone.

Question 4

A company is running SAP HANA on a bare metal EC2 instance. The system experiences a hardware failure that causes an instance stop. The company needs to recover the instance quickly. What should the company do to minimize recovery time?

Accepted Answer

Configure an Amazon CloudWatch alarm to automatically recover the instance. Amazon CloudWatch can automatically recover an impaired EC2 instance by restarting it on new underlying hardware, preserving the instance ID, private IP, Elastic IP, and EBS attachments. This minimizes recovery time by eliminating manual intervention and leveraging AWS's automated recovery mechanism, which is specifically designed for hardware failures on bare metal instances like those running SAP HANA.

Answer

Use AWS CloudFormation to recreate the instance

Answer

Manually start the instance from the EC2 console

Answer

Restore the instance from the latest EBS snapshot

Question 5

A company runs SAP ERP Central Component (ECC) on AWS with an Oracle database. The system is deployed on a single EC2 instance with EBS volumes. The company has scheduled a maintenance window for applying Oracle patches. The database administrator (DBA) will apply the patches during the maintenance window, which requires the database to be shut down. The DBA wants to minimize downtime and ensure that if the patching fails, the system can be rolled back quickly. The current setup includes daily EBS snapshots of the data volume, but these are taken at midnight. What should the DBA do to minimize downtime and ensure a quick rollback?

Accepted Answer

Create a snapshot of the EBS data volume immediately before applying the patches. If the patching fails, restore the volume from the snapshot.. Creating a snapshot of the EBS data volume immediately before applying the patches captures a point-in-time, crash-consistent state of the Oracle database. Since the database will be shut down during the maintenance window, this snapshot provides a reliable restore point. If patching fails, the DBA can quickly restore the volume from this snapshot, minimizing downtime by avoiding the need to restore from the older midnight snapshot, which would lose an entire day's worth of transactions.

Answer

Use AWS Database Migration Service (DMS) to create a replica of the database before patching. If patching fails, redirect traffic to the replica.

Answer

Create an AMI of the entire EC2 instance before the maintenance window. If patching fails, launch a new instance from the AMI.

Answer

Stop the EC2 instance, create a snapshot of the data volume, then apply the patches. If patching fails, restore from the snapshot.

Question 6

A company is running SAP on EC2 instances with EBS volumes. They need to take daily snapshots of the EBS volumes and retain them for 90 days. Which approach is most cost-effective?

Accepted Answer

Use Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager (DLM) to automate snapshots and set a retention policy of 90 days.. Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager (DLM) automates the creation and deletion of EBS snapshots, allowing you to set a retention policy of 90 days. This is cost-effective as old snapshots are automatically deleted. Option B is incorrect because S3 Lifecycle policies manage objects in S3, not EBS snapshots; snapshots are stored in S3 but are managed by DLM or AWS Backup. Option C is incorrect because storing snapshots indefinitely would incur unnecessary costs. Option D, AWS Backup, is a managed service that can be used but may have additional costs compared to DLM, and DLM is specifically designed for cost-effective snapshot management.

Answer

Use S3 Lifecycle policies to transition snapshots to Glacier after 90 days.

Answer

Create a script that takes snapshots daily and stores them indefinitely.

Answer

Use AWS Backup to schedule backups and set retention to 90 days.

Question 7

Which THREE of the following are best practices for securing an SAP HANA database on AWS? (Choose 3.)

Accepted Answer

Enable encryption at rest for EBS volumes attached to the HANA instance. Encrypting EBS volumes at rest protects the underlying storage of the SAP HANA database from unauthorized physical access or snapshot theft. AWS KMS-managed keys or customer-managed keys can be used to enforce encryption for all data written to the EBS block devices, which is a fundamental security best practice for any sensitive workload on AWS.

Answer

Assign a public IP address to the HANA instance for easy access

Answer

Disable the HANA password policy to simplify user access

Question 8

A company is running SAP HANA on an EC2 instance. The storage is configured with multiple EBS volumes striped using LVM. The SAP administrator notices that disk I/O latency spikes during peak hours. Which change would MOST effectively reduce latency without incurring additional cost?

Accepted Answer

Use an EBS-optimized EC2 instance type. Using an EBS-optimized EC2 instance provides dedicated network bandwidth for EBS I/O, which reduces contention and latency without additional cost if the instance type already supports it. Option A is incorrect because increasing the size of EBS volumes does not directly reduce latency. Option B is incorrect because provisioning additional IOPS incurs extra cost, contradicting the requirement. Option C is incorrect because switching to RAID 0 striping improves throughput but does not lower latency.

Answer

Increase the size of the EBS volumes

Answer

Provision additional IOPS on the EBS volumes

Answer

Switch from LVM to RAID 0 striping

Question 9

An SAP system administrator is troubleshooting a failed HANA database backup to Amazon S3. The backup job returns an error: 'Access Denied'. Which TWO actions should the administrator take to resolve the issue?

Accepted Answer

Review the S3 bucket policy for any deny statements that may block the backup.. Options A and C are correct because reviewing the S3 bucket policy for deny statements that may block the backup is a direct step to resolve an 'Access Denied' error, and checking the IAM role attached to the EC2 instance for S3 permissions is also a primary cause of access issues. Option B is incorrect because S3 Transfer Acceleration improves speed, not access. Option D is incorrect because the KMS key being enabled is not a direct cause of access denied; rather, the IAM role must have permission to use the key. Option E is incorrect because a VPC endpoint is not required if using public S3.

Answer

Enable S3 Transfer Acceleration on the bucket.

Answer

Verify that the S3 bucket's KMS key is enabled.

Answer

Set up a VPC endpoint for S3.

Question 10

An SAP Basis administrator needs to monitor the performance of SAP HANA database using Amazon CloudWatch. Which of the following metrics should be monitored to detect potential CPU bottlenecks?

Accepted Answer

CPUUtilization. (CPUUtilization) is the correct metric to monitor for detecting CPU bottlenecks in SAP HANA on Amazon CloudWatch. CPUUtilization directly measures the percentage of CPU capacity being used. High values indicate CPU contention. Option A (MemoryUtilization) indicates memory pressure, not CPU. Option B (DiskReadBytes/DiskWriteBytes) indicates I/O activity. Option D (NetworkPacketsIn/NetworkPacketsOut) indicates network traffic, none of which directly measure CPU bottlenecks.

Answer

MemoryUtilization

Answer

DiskReadBytes / DiskWriteBytes

Answer

NetworkPacketsIn / NetworkPacketsOut

Question 11

A company is deploying SAP S/4HANA on AWS and needs to ensure high availability for the central services (ASCS and ERS). The architecture uses two EC2 instances in different Availability Zones with a shared file system using Amazon EFS for /sapmnt. The SAP system is configured with an enqueue replication server. The operations team needs to automate the failover of the ASCS instance in case of a failure. The team is considering using AWS services for this purpose. Which approach should the team use?

Accepted Answer

Use Amazon Route 53 with health checks and a custom script to update DNS record on failover.. Route 53 health checks can monitor the ASCS instance and a custom script can update DNS records to point to the standby instance on failure, enabling failover across Availability Zones. Option B is incorrect because an Application Load Balancer cannot properly direct traffic to a single active ASCS instance and does not handle the stateful nature of SAP enqueue replication. Option C is incorrect because Auto Scaling is designed for scaling out, not for failover of stateful services like ASCS. Option D is incorrect because EC2 Auto Recovery only recovers the same instance on new hardware if it fails, but it does not failover to a different Availability Zone, which is required for high availability.

Answer

Use an Application Load Balancer with a target group containing both ASCS instances.

Answer

Use an Auto Scaling group with a minimum of 2 instances and a lifecycle hook to handle failover.

Answer

Enable EC2 Auto Recovery to automatically recover the ASCS instance on new hardware.

Question 12

A company needs to migrate its SAP application server from on-premises to AWS. The server runs on Windows Server 2012 R2 and has a custom SAP kernel. Which AWS service should be used to migrate the server with minimal changes?

Accepted Answer

AWS Application Migration Service (AWS MGN). AWS Application Migration Service (AWS MGN) automates the lift-and-shift migration of servers from on-premises to AWS, supporting Windows Server and custom configurations such as SAP kernels. Option A (CloudEndure Migration) is wrong because CloudEndure has been superseded by AWS MGN and is no longer recommended for new migrations. Option B (AWS DMS) is wrong because it specializes in database migrations, not entire server instances. Option D (AWS SMS) is wrong because it is an older, less flexible service that may not handle custom kernels as effectively as MGN.

Answer

AWS CloudEndure Migration

Answer

AWS Database Migration Service (AWS DMS)

Answer

AWS Server Migration Service (AWS SMS)

Question 13

A company is migrating its SAP ERP system to AWS. The SAP application requires low-latency access to the database and high network throughput between application and database tiers. Which AWS architecture should the company use?

Accepted Answer

Use a placement group with enhanced networking for both application and database instances.. Using a placement group with enhanced networking for both application and database instances ensures low latency and high network throughput between tiers. Option A is incorrect because placing the SAP application servers in a different AWS Region than the database adds significant latency due to geographic distance. Option B is incorrect because Amazon S3 is an object storage service, not a suitable database storage layer for SAP ERP, which requires block storage with low latency. Option C is incorrect because placing the application servers in one Availability Zone and the database in another Availability Zone introduces additional network latency compared to placing them in the same AZ with a placement group.

Answer

Place the SAP application servers in a different AWS Region than the database.

Answer

Use Amazon S3 as the database storage layer.

Answer

Place the SAP application servers in one Availability Zone and the database in another Availability Zone.

Question 14

An organization is migrating its SAP ERP system to AWS. The system uses SAP NetWeaver and a third-party backup tool that requires direct access to the database files. Which AWS storage option should be used for the database to ensure compatibility?

Accepted Answer

Amazon EBS. (Amazon EBS) is correct because EBS provides block-level storage that can be mounted as a raw device, allowing backup tools to directly access database files. Option A (Amazon EFS) is wrong because EFS is a file storage service, not block-level. Option B (Amazon FSx for Windows File Server) is wrong because FSx for Windows is file storage for Windows workloads, not block-level. Option D (Amazon S3) is wrong because S3 is object storage, not block-level.

Answer

Amazon EFS

Answer

Amazon FSx for Windows File Server

Answer

Amazon S3

Question 15

A company uses AWS Systems Manager Patch Manager to patch a fleet of EC2 instances. After a recent patching operation, some instances failed with the error 'Unable to retrieve patch baseline'. The instances are in a private subnet with a VPC endpoint for SSM. What is the MOST likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The VPC endpoint for SSM does not have a security group that allows HTTPS outbound to the endpoint. The error 'Unable to retrieve patch baseline' indicates that the EC2 instances cannot communicate with the AWS Systems Manager service to fetch the patch baseline configuration. Since the instances are in a private subnet with a VPC endpoint for SSM, the most likely cause is that the VPC endpoint's security group does not allow HTTPS outbound traffic (port 443) to the endpoint itself. Without this outbound rule, the SSM Agent on the instance cannot establish the TLS connection required to retrieve the patch baseline from the SSM API.

Answer

The CodeDeploy agent on the instances is outdated

Answer

The instances are not registered as managed instances with the SSM ManagedInstance role

Answer

The instances do not have an IAM instance profile attached

Question 16

An SAP system running on AWS has a recurring issue where the SAP application server becomes unresponsive every evening at 8 PM. The administrator suspects a batch job causing high CPU usage. Which set of AWS services can best help identify the root cause?

Accepted Answer

Amazon CloudWatch and AWS Systems Manager Run Command. (Amazon CloudWatch and AWS Systems Manager Run Command) is correct because CloudWatch monitors CPU metrics (e.g., CPUUtilization) to identify high usage patterns, and Run Command can execute scripts on the EC2 instance to collect OS-level logs, process lists, and batch job details during the incident. This combination provides both metric visibility and remediation/forensic capabilities. Option A (X-Ray) is for application tracing, not OS-level CPU analysis. Option B (CloudTrail) logs API calls, not OS metrics. Option C (Lambda) lacks native OS command execution; Run Command provides direct, secure access to collect logs without additional setup.

Answer

AWS X-Ray and Amazon CloudWatch

Answer

Amazon CloudWatch and AWS CloudTrail

Answer

Amazon CloudWatch and AWS Lambda

Question 17

A company is running SAP HANA on AWS using a scale-out architecture with multiple worker nodes. The system is used for real-time analytics. Recently, query performance has degraded. The HANA administrator notices that the data is not evenly distributed across nodes. What is the best course of action?

Accepted Answer

Redistribute the tables across nodes using HANA's table partitioning features.. SAP HANA's table partitioning features allow you to redistribute data across worker nodes in a scale-out architecture, addressing the root cause of uneven data distribution. This rebalancing improves query performance by ensuring parallel processing and minimizing data movement between nodes. The HANA administrator can use commands like ALTER TABLE ... REBALANCE or partition management to achieve even distribution.

Answer

Increase the memory allocation for the HANA database.

Answer

Add more worker nodes to the scale-out cluster to distribute the load.

Answer

Upgrade the EC2 instance type of all nodes to a memory-optimized type.

Question 18

A company is running SAP HANA on a memory-optimized EC2 instance with an EBS volume for /hana/data and /hana/log. The database administrator notices that the /hana/log volume is experiencing high write latency. The current volume is a gp2 volume with 1000 GB size. Which change would most effectively reduce write latency?

Accepted Answer

Ensure the EC2 instance is EBS-optimized and use a higher instance type with dedicated EBS bandwidth.. Using EBS-optimized instances with dedicated EBS bandwidth reduces contention and latency, improving write performance for SAP HANA log. Option A is wrong because changing to st1 is not ideal for log writes; st1 is optimized for throughput, not low latency, and has variable performance. Option B is wrong because increasing volume size increases baseline IOPS for gp2 but does not directly address write latency; latency is influenced more by burst credits and instance EBS bandwidth. Option C is wrong because enabling Multi-Attach does not reduce latency; it allows multiple instances to attach the same volume but can introduce contention.

Answer

Change the volume type to st1 (throughput optimized) for better write throughput.

Answer

Increase the volume size to 2000 GB to get more IOPS.

Answer

Enable Multi-Attach on the volume to distribute writes.

Question 19

An SAP Basis team is designing a high-availability (HA) setup for SAP NetWeaver on AWS. They plan to use a shared file system for transport directories. Which storage solution provides the most cost-effective NFS share with support for automatic failover across Availability Zones?

Accepted Answer

Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP. Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP is the correct choice because it provides a fully managed, highly available NFS share that supports automatic failover across Availability Zones (AZs) using NetApp's SnapMirror and multi-AZ HA pair architecture. It is the most cost-effective solution for SAP transport directories that require a shared file system with cross-AZ failover, as it offers native NFSv3/v4.1 support, consistent performance, and lower total cost of ownership compared to alternatives for this specific SAP workload.

Answer

Amazon Elastic File System (EFS)

Answer

Amazon EBS Multi-Attach gp3 volume

Answer

Amazon S3 with AWS Storage Gateway file gateway

Question 20

A company is planning to migrate its SAP ERP system to AWS. The system requires high availability with automatic failover and minimal data loss. Which TWO strategies should the company implement to meet these requirements?

Accepted Answer

Deploy the SAP ASCS instance in a Multi-AZ configuration using AWS services.. Deploying the SAP ASCS instance in a Multi-AZ configuration using AWS services (such as an Amazon RDS Multi-AZ DB instance for the SAP system database or a Multi-AZ deployment for the SAP Central Services) provides automatic failover to a standby instance in a different Availability Zone, ensuring high availability with minimal data loss. This setup leverages synchronous replication to keep the standby synchronized, so failover occurs without significant data loss.

Answer

Implement daily snapshots of all SAP EBS volumes using AWS Backup.

Answer

Use AWS Elastic Disaster Recovery to replicate the entire SAP environment to a different Region.

Answer

Use Amazon S3 cross-region replication for all SAP application files.