DEA-C01 Data Ingestion and Transformation Practice Question
A data engineer is designing a pipeline to ingest change data capture (CDC) events from an Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL database into Amazon S3. The CDC events are captured using AWS DMS. The data must be available for querying within 5 minutes of the change. Which approach meets these requirements?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is that candidates may overcomplicate the solution by introducing intermediate services (like Redshift or SQS) when DMS’s native S3 target endpoint already provides near-real-time CDC replication, and they may confuse pg_dump (a batch export tool) with a CDC mechanism.
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
✓
Use AWS DMS to replicate data directly to S3 in near real-time.
AWS DMS supports continuous replication (change data capture) directly to Amazon S3 as a target endpoint. DMS can write CDC events to S3 in near real-time (typically seconds to minutes), meeting the 5-minute latency requirement without intermediate services. The data is stored in comma-separated value (CSV) or Parquet format, ready for querying via Athena or Glue.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Export the database to S3 using pg_dump and then use AWS Glue to load into S3 in Parquet format.
Why it's wrong here
pg_dump is a batch export, not CDC.
- ✗
Use AWS DMS to replicate data to Amazon Redshift, then unload to S3.
Why it's wrong here
Using AWS DMS to replicate to Amazon Redshift introduces latency from Redshift’s COPY and UNLOAD operations, which can exceed the 5-minute window for CDC ingestion into S3. This approach is tempting because Redshift is optimised for analytical queries, and unloading to S3 is a common pattern for sharing processed datasets, but it fails here due to the additional staging and transformation steps that delay S3 availability.
- ✓
Use AWS DMS to replicate data directly to S3 in near real-time.
Why this is correct
DMS can write CDC to S3 with low latency.
- ✗
Use AWS DMS to replicate data to an SQS queue, then process with Lambda to write to S3.
Why it's wrong here
This adds unnecessary complexity and latency.
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 |
Go deeper
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Same concept, more angles
1 more way this is tested on DEA-C01
These questions test the same concept from different angles. Work through them to make sure you can recognise it however the exam phrases it.
Variation 1. A data engineer needs to capture change data capture (CDC) events from an Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL database and stream them to Amazon S3 in near real-time. Which AWS service should be used?
easy- A.Amazon S3 Transfer Acceleration
- B.Amazon Athena
- ✓ C.AWS Database Migration Service (AWS DMS)
- D.Amazon Kinesis Data Streams
Why C: AWS DMS supports continuous replication from PostgreSQL source databases using logical replication slots to capture CDC events in near real-time. It can directly stream these changes to Amazon S3 as a target, making it the correct choice for this use case.
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DEA-C01 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the DEA-C01 exam.