ECS service auto scaling in AWS - Mini Project: Build & Apply

ECS Service Auto Scaling Setup

📖 Scenario: You manage a web application running on AWS ECS (Elastic Container Service). To handle varying traffic, you want the ECS service to automatically adjust the number of running tasks.This project guides you to create an ECS service with auto scaling configured to increase or decrease the number of tasks based on CPU usage.

🎯 Goal: Build an ECS service with auto scaling enabled that adjusts the number of tasks between 1 and 4 based on CPU utilization thresholds.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an ECS cluster named my-ecs-cluster

Create an ECS service named my-ecs-service running a sample task

Configure auto scaling for the ECS service with minimum 1 and maximum 4 tasks

Set a target tracking scaling policy to maintain CPU utilization at 50%

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Auto scaling ECS services is common in real applications to save costs and maintain performance during traffic changes.

💼 Career

Cloud engineers and DevOps professionals often configure ECS auto scaling to ensure applications run smoothly and efficiently.

1

Create ECS Cluster

Create an ECS cluster named my-ecs-cluster using AWS CLI syntax.

AWS

# Create ECS cluster named my-ecs-cluster
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use the AWS CLI command aws ecs create-cluster with the --cluster-name option.

2

Create ECS Service

Create an ECS service named my-ecs-service in cluster my-ecs-cluster with desired count 1 and a sample task definition sample-task.

AWS

aws ecs create-cluster --cluster-name my-ecs-cluster
# Create ECS service named my-ecs-service with desired count 1 and task definition sample-task
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use aws ecs create-service with --cluster, --service-name, --task-definition, and --desired-count options.

3

Configure Auto Scaling Target

Create an Application Auto Scaling target for the ECS service my-ecs-service in cluster my-ecs-cluster with minimum capacity 1 and maximum capacity 4.

AWS

aws ecs create-cluster --cluster-name my-ecs-cluster
aws ecs create-service --cluster my-ecs-cluster --service-name my-ecs-service --task-definition sample-task --desired-count 1
# Register scalable target with min capacity 1 and max capacity 4
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use aws application-autoscaling register-scalable-target with the correct --resource-id and capacity limits.

4

Create Target Tracking Scaling Policy

Create a target tracking scaling policy named cpu-utilization-policy for the ECS service my-ecs-service in cluster my-ecs-cluster to maintain CPU utilization at 50%.

AWS

aws ecs create-cluster --cluster-name my-ecs-cluster
aws ecs create-service --cluster my-ecs-cluster --service-name my-ecs-service --task-definition sample-task --desired-count 1
aws application-autoscaling register-scalable-target --service-namespace ecs --resource-id service/my-ecs-cluster/my-ecs-service --scalable-dimension ecs:service:DesiredCount --min-capacity 1 --max-capacity 4
# Create target tracking scaling policy to maintain CPU utilization at 50%
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Create a JSON file named policy.json with the target tracking configuration and use it with put-scaling-policy.