DEA-C01 Data Ingestion and Transformation Practice Question
A company runs a SQL Server transactional database on Amazon RDS. They need to capture change data (inserts, updates, deletes) in near real-time and replicate them to an Amazon S3 data lake. Which AWS service is most suitable?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates confuse Kinesis Data Streams as a general-purpose streaming solution for any real-time data, but it lacks native CDC capabilities for relational databases without additional custom code or connectors, making DMS the correct choice for database-to-S3 replication.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
AWS Database Migration Service (DMS) with change data capture
AWS DMS with change data capture (CDC) is the most suitable service because it can continuously capture and replicate incremental changes (inserts, updates, deletes) from a SQL Server transactional database on Amazon RDS to an S3 data lake in near real-time. DMS uses native SQL Server transaction logs (e.g., MS-CDC or log-based replication) to read changes without impacting source performance, and it supports target S3 in formats like Parquet or CSV. This directly meets the requirement for near-real-time CDC replication to a data lake.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
AWS Database Migration Service (DMS) with change data capture
Why this is correct
DMS supports ongoing replication with CDC and can write to S3.
- ✗
AWS Glue DataBrew
Why it's wrong here
DataBrew is a visual data preparation tool, not for replication.
- ✗
Amazon Kinesis Data Streams with Kinesis Client Library
Why it's wrong here
Kinesis requires custom integration to capture CDC from RDS.
- ✗
Amazon Redshift Spectrum
Why it's wrong here
Redshift Spectrum queries data in S3, it does not ingest.
Quick reference
AWS S3 Storage Class Comparison
| Storage Class | Min Duration | Retrieval | Use Case |
|---|---|---|---|
| S3 Standard | None | Immediate | Frequently accessed data |
| S3 Standard-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Infrequent access, rapid retrieval |
| S3 One Zone-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Non-critical infrequent data |
| S3 Intelligent-Tiering | None | Immediate–hours | Unknown or changing access patterns |
| S3 Glacier Instant | 90 days | Milliseconds | Archive with instant retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Flexible | 90 days | Minutes–hours | Archive, flexible retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Deep Archive | 180 days | Hours | Long-term compliance archive |
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
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