DVA-C02 Development with AWS Services Practice Question
A company is using Amazon RDS for MySQL with Multi-AZ deployment. The application writes to the database using the primary endpoint. The company wants to improve read performance and offload read traffic from the primary instance. Which TWO actions should the company take? (Choose TWO.)
⚠ Common exam trap
A common mix-up: candidates confuse Multi-AZ standby instances with read replicas—candidates often think the standby can serve reads, but it is a passive replica that only becomes active during failover and has no accessible endpoint for read queries.
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
✓
Create an Amazon RDS read replica in the same region.
Amazon RDS read replicas are designed to offload read traffic from the primary DB instance. A read replica is an asynchronous copy of the primary that can serve SELECT queries, improving read performance without impacting write operations on the primary. Option C is correct because the application must explicitly use the read replica's endpoint for read queries; the replica does not automatically balance traffic. Together, creating a read replica and modifying the application to direct SELECT queries to its endpoint achieves the goal of improving read performance and offloading the primary.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Create an Amazon RDS read replica in the same region.
Why this is correct
Creating an Amazon RDS read replica in the same region provides an asynchronously replicated copy of the primary database instance. This replica is specifically designed to handle read-only queries, such as SELECT statements, thereby offloading the read workload from the primary instance. By distributing read traffic, the primary instance's CPU, I/O, and connection utilization are significantly reduced, allowing it to dedicate resources to write operations and maintain optimal performance for critical transactions.
- ✗
Add another primary instance and configure replication.
Why it's wrong here
Amazon RDS for MySQL, particularly in a Multi-AZ configuration, operates with a single primary instance responsible for all write operations. It does not support a multi-master or active-active primary setup where multiple instances can simultaneously accept writes and replicate changes amongst themselves. Attempting to add another primary instance and configure replication would deviate from the standard RDS operational model, leading to unsupported configurations and potential data consistency issues.
- ✓
Modify the application to use the read replica endpoint for SELECT queries.
Why this is correct
After a read replica is provisioned, the application code must be explicitly modified to direct all read-only queries to the read replica's unique endpoint. This architectural change is crucial for effectively offloading the primary database, as the application will then send SELECT statements directly to the replica. This ensures that the primary instance can focus exclusively on write operations and transactional integrity, enhancing overall database performance and scalability for read-heavy workloads.
- ✗
Use the Multi-AZ secondary instance endpoint for read queries.
Why it's wrong here
In an Amazon RDS Multi-AZ deployment, the secondary instance serves as a synchronous standby replica, located in a different Availability Zone, solely for high availability and disaster recovery purposes. This secondary instance does not have an accessible endpoint for applications to send read queries and is not designed to serve any traffic. Its only function is to automatically take over as the primary in the event of a failover, making it unavailable for direct application interaction.
- ✗
Enable Amazon RDS Proxy to distribute read queries across instances.
Why it's wrong here
Amazon RDS Proxy is a fully managed, highly available database proxy that primarily focuses on efficient connection management, including connection pooling and multiplexing, to reduce overhead on the database. While it sits between the application and the database, its core functionality does not include intelligent read/write splitting or distributing read queries across multiple read replicas. RDS Proxy enhances application resilience during failovers and manages connections, but it does not inherently create or manage read-specific endpoints for scaling read operations.
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