SAP-C02 Design for New Solutions Practice Question
A company is designing a new real-time analytics platform that ingests data from thousands of IoT devices. The devices send JSON messages every second to an AWS IoT Core topic. The messages must be processed and stored in Amazon S3 for long-term analysis. The processing includes enrichment by calling a third-party API to add location data. The company expects the workload to vary significantly, with peak traffic of 100,000 messages per second. The solution must be cost-effective and minimize operational overhead. The current architecture uses a Lambda function subscribed to the IoT topic, which processes each message and writes to S3. However, during initial testing, the Lambda function frequently times out due to the third-party API latency, causing message loss. What should the company do to resolve this issue while meeting all requirements?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to think Kinesis Data Firehose is the best choice for buffering and enrichment, but they overlook that Firehose does not support real-time enrichment via Lambda before writing to S3; it only supports transformation with a Lambda function that has a limited timeout (60 seconds) and cannot handle asynchronous API calls reliably.
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
✓
Configure the IoT rule to write messages to an Amazon SQS queue. Then use a Lambda function with reserved concurrency to poll the queue and process messages at a controlled rate
Decoupling the ingestion from the processing using an SQS queue allows the Lambda function to poll messages at a controlled rate, preventing timeouts from third-party API latency. The SQS queue acts as a buffer, absorbing traffic spikes of up to 100,000 messages per second, and Lambda can process messages asynchronously without loss. This approach is cost-effective and minimizes operational overhead by leveraging managed services.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Increase the Lambda function timeout to 15 minutes and memory to 10240 MB
Why it's wrong here
Increasing timeout may still result in timeouts if API latency varies, and higher memory increases cost.
- ✗
Use Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose to buffer data and write to S3, then trigger a Lambda function to enrich data asynchronously
Why it's wrong here
Firehose can buffer but enrichment via API call is not supported; writing raw data first then enriching adds complexity.
- ✗
Enable Provisioned Concurrency on the Lambda function to reduce cold starts
Why it's wrong here
Provisioned Concurrency does not address API latency causing timeouts.
- ✓
Configure the IoT rule to write messages to an Amazon SQS queue. Then use a Lambda function with reserved concurrency to poll the queue and process messages at a controlled rate
Why this is correct
SQS decouples ingestion from processing, preventing message loss, and reserved concurrency ensures consistent performance.
Visual reference
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
This SAP-C02 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 SAP-C02 exam.