Disaster recovery strategies (backup, pilot light, warm standby) in AWS - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Disaster Recovery Strategies Setup on AWS

📖 Scenario: You work for a company that wants to protect its website from failures. You will create simple AWS infrastructure setups to practice three disaster recovery strategies: backup, pilot light, and warm standby.

🎯 Goal: Build AWS infrastructure code snippets that represent the backup, pilot light, and warm standby disaster recovery strategies using AWS resources.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an S3 bucket for backups

Create a minimal pilot light setup with a small EC2 instance

Create a warm standby setup with a running EC2 instance and a load balancer

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Companies use disaster recovery strategies to keep their websites and applications running during failures or disasters.

💼 Career

Cloud architects and engineers design and implement disaster recovery plans using AWS resources to ensure business continuity.

1

Create an S3 bucket for backups

Create an AWS CloudFormation resource named BackupBucket of type AWS::S3::Bucket with the bucket name company-backup-bucket.

AWS

# Create an S3 bucket resource named BackupBucket
# Your code here

Hint

Use the AWS::S3::Bucket resource type and set BucketName property.

2

Add a pilot light EC2 instance

Add an AWS CloudFormation resource named PilotLightInstance of type AWS::EC2::Instance with instance type t3.micro and AMI ID ami-0abcdef1234567890.

AWS

Resources:
  BackupBucket:
    Type: AWS::S3::Bucket
    Properties:
      BucketName: company-backup-bucket
# Add a pilot light EC2 instance resource named PilotLightInstance
# Your code here

Hint

Use AWS::EC2::Instance with InstanceType and ImageId properties.

3

Add a warm standby EC2 instance

Add an AWS CloudFormation resource named WarmStandbyInstance of type AWS::EC2::Instance with instance type t3.medium and AMI ID ami-0abcdef1234567890.

AWS

Resources:
  BackupBucket:
    Type: AWS::S3::Bucket
    Properties:
      BucketName: company-backup-bucket
  PilotLightInstance:
    Type: AWS::EC2::Instance
    Properties:
      InstanceType: t3.micro
      ImageId: ami-0abcdef1234567890
# Add a warm standby EC2 instance resource named WarmStandbyInstance
# Your code here

Hint

Use AWS::EC2::Instance with a larger instance type for warm standby.

4

Add a load balancer for warm standby

Add an AWS CloudFormation resource named WarmStandbyLoadBalancer of type AWS::ElasticLoadBalancingV2::LoadBalancer with scheme internet-facing.

AWS

Resources:
  BackupBucket:
    Type: AWS::S3::Bucket
    Properties:
      BucketName: company-backup-bucket
  PilotLightInstance:
    Type: AWS::EC2::Instance
    Properties:
      InstanceType: t3.micro
      ImageId: ami-0abcdef1234567890
  WarmStandbyInstance:
    Type: AWS::EC2::Instance
    Properties:
      InstanceType: t3.medium
      ImageId: ami-0abcdef1234567890
# Add a load balancer resource named WarmStandbyLoadBalancer
# Your code here

Hint

Use AWS::ElasticLoadBalancingV2::LoadBalancer with Scheme set to internet-facing.

Practice

1. Which disaster recovery strategy involves keeping a minimal version of your environment running to quickly scale up after a failure?

easy

A. Pilot light

B. Backup

C. Warm standby

D. Cold standby

Solution

1. Step 1: Understand pilot light strategy

   Pilot light keeps a minimal core of your environment running, like a small copy of critical systems.

2. Step 2: Compare with other strategies

   Backup stores data but requires full rebuild; warm standby runs a scaled-down version ready to take over; cold standby is offline.

3. Final Answer:

   Pilot light -> Option A

4. Quick Check:

   Minimal running core = Pilot light [OK]

Hint: Minimal running core means pilot light strategy [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Confusing warm standby with pilot light
• Thinking backup keeps systems running
• Assuming cold standby is always active

2. Which AWS service is commonly used to create backups for disaster recovery?

easy

A. Amazon S3

B. Amazon EC2

C. AWS Lambda

D. Amazon VPC

Solution

1. Step 1: Identify backup storage service

   Amazon S3 is designed for durable, scalable storage, ideal for backups.

2. Step 2: Exclude other services

   EC2 is compute, Lambda is serverless code, VPC is networking, none are primarily for backups.

3. Final Answer:

   Amazon S3 -> Option A

4. Quick Check:

   Backup storage = Amazon S3 [OK]

Hint: Backup storage in AWS is Amazon S3 [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Choosing EC2 as backup storage
• Confusing Lambda with storage
• Selecting VPC for backups

3. Given a warm standby setup in AWS, which of the following best describes its state before a disaster occurs?

medium

A. Fully scaled production environment running in parallel

B. Minimal core systems running, rest offline

C. No environment running, only backups stored

D. Scaled-down but fully functional environment running

Solution

1. Step 1: Understand warm standby state

   Warm standby runs a scaled-down but fully functional environment ready to take over quickly.

2. Step 2: Compare with other options

   Fully scaled parallel is active-active, minimal core is pilot light, no environment is backup only.

3. Final Answer:

   Scaled-down but fully functional environment running -> Option D

4. Quick Check:

   Warm standby = scaled-down functional environment [OK]

Hint: Warm standby runs scaled-down functional environment [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Confusing warm standby with full production
• Mixing pilot light with warm standby
• Thinking backup means no running environment

4. You set up a pilot light disaster recovery strategy but notice recovery time is longer than expected. What is the most likely cause?

medium

A. Backups are stored in Amazon S3

B. The pilot light environment is not fully configured and requires manual scaling

C. Warm standby environment is running at full capacity

D. The primary environment is still active

Solution

1. Step 1: Analyze pilot light recovery process

   Pilot light requires scaling up minimal systems to full production, so incomplete setup delays recovery.

2. Step 2: Exclude unrelated options

   Backups in S3 are normal; warm standby running full is unrelated; primary active is normal operation.

3. Final Answer:

   The pilot light environment is not fully configured and requires manual scaling -> Option B

4. Quick Check:

   Pilot light slow recovery = incomplete setup [OK]

Hint: Incomplete pilot light setup causes slow recovery [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Blaming backups for slow recovery
• Confusing warm standby with pilot light
• Assuming primary environment affects recovery time

5. A company wants a disaster recovery solution that balances cost and recovery speed. They want a system running at all times but at reduced capacity, ready to scale up quickly. Which strategy should they choose?

hard

A. Backup only

B. Pilot light

C. Warm standby

D. Cold standby

Solution

1. Step 1: Understand company needs

   They want a running system at reduced capacity that can scale quickly, balancing cost and speed.

2. Step 2: Match needs to strategies

   Backup only is slow recovery; pilot light is minimal core only; cold standby is offline; warm standby runs scaled-down environment ready to scale.

3. Final Answer:

   Warm standby -> Option C

4. Quick Check:

   Running reduced capacity system = Warm standby [OK]

Hint: Running reduced capacity system means warm standby [OK]

Common Mistakes:

• Choosing pilot light for running full system
• Confusing backup with standby strategies
• Selecting cold standby for fast recovery