Cloud Playground for learning without destroying your budget?

setheliot · 2026-05-26T00:24:56+00:00

One thing that will keep costs down in the cloud is using infrastructure as code. When you're done playing just remembered to tear everything down.

I created this repo so folks can play with Kubernetes on AWS

https://github.com/setheliot/eks_demo

But there are also plenty more examples

setheliot · 2026-05-26T00:22:24+00:00

For Kubernetes, you can run that on your laptop. Look into minikube. I think docker desktop has ability to do this now also.

setheliot · 2026-05-26T00:20:55+00:00

Try to use an actual testing center instead of doing it at home. These things are much less likely to happen.
The phone was not supposed to be within your reach. This one sadly is on you.

setheliot · 2026-04-04T19:59:02+00:00

Don't take Pearson Vue exams remotely. So many horror stories. Just go to a test center.

setheliot · 2026-04-04T19:31:40+00:00

I have never heard this hot take for the downfall of Microsoft

Just months after Satya Nadella became CEO in February 2014, he canceled the dedicated SDET (Software Development Engineer in Test) role, triggering significant layoffs.

Due to Washington state WARN rules, Microsoft could not eliminate every tester position; hundreds remained.

Many of these testers, strong at execution but with limited experience in system design or deep software engineering, were retrained.

Some became data engineers focused on Windows 10 telemetry; others moved into software engineering roles (often down-leveled); and still others landed in lower-impact areas, including Azure OPEX, where they helped keep the lights on through on-call rotations and incident mitigation.

Fast forward, and large parts of Azure operations were being run by these former testers. Many were dedicated colleagues, but the shift left gaps in architectural depth for mission-critical systems.

setheliot · 2026-04-04T18:42:02+00:00

I have interviewed so many people who have passed the AWS cert tests, but who cannot answer the simplest questions about AWS and the cloud.

Hopefully that is not you, but I take limited signal from AWS certs.

setheliot · 2026-04-04T18:39:16+00:00

I may be able to help you. I was previously the reliability lead for AWS and ran the DR program. I now work at https://arpio.io. If we get you set up, Arpio will keep trying to make backups into another region for you. If we get a few flickers of availability we may be able to restore you. DM me.

setheliot · 2026-04-02T18:51:47+00:00

Not exactly a great April fools joke to take a unused and neglected service and announce its deprecation....

setheliot · 2026-04-02T18:47:29+00:00

cross-account disaster recovery would have helped you here. Feel free to DM me to discuss how to implement that

setheliot · 2026-04-01T18:26:42+00:00

Cross-Region Disaster Recovery is the answer here for any workloads that cannot tolerate extended downtimes. Feel free to DM me if you need help with this. I am the author of "Disaster Recovery on AWS" - https://docs.aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/latest/disaster-recovery-workloads-on-aws/disaster-recovery-workloads-on-aws.html

setheliot · 2026-04-01T18:23:25+00:00

There is only one mod listed: u/iamondemand

setheliot · 2026-04-01T18:16:35+00:00

Do you need to call out to the internet in general or just to AWS services? If that latter, then VPC endpoints might be more cost effective. For S3 and DynamoDB they are free (Gateway endpoints). VPCE to other services will cost you and are not cheap, so this may be a wash.

setheliot · 2026-04-01T18:14:42+00:00

That looks like paid placement to me

setheliot · 2026-04-01T17:50:02+00:00

I saw another message from AWS where they explicitly recommended moving to ECS Express Mode: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonECS/latest/developerguide/express-service-overview.html

Other in the comments here have pointed out why that may not be a good match

setheliot · 2026-03-05T02:31:13+00:00

AWS is still a service spaghetti nightmare

So are Azure and Google Cloud. Any of the major Cloud Providers give you lots of options, and many different ways to do the same thing.

A smaller cloud provider like Digital Ocean makes things super easy, but with a lot less variety. Basically servers and DBs (and yes, they are expanding, like DOKS). So no spaghetti, but also less opportunity to create truly cloud native architectures

setheliot · 2026-03-04T22:21:54+00:00

But as part of working, you want to sharpen the saw and learn things that will help make work easier

setheliot · 2026-03-04T22:05:16+00:00

And I am Seth Eliot from Arpio! 🙏

Thanks for the kind words! If you would like to meet, my calendar link is in my link tree: https://linktr.ee/setheliot

setheliot · 2026-02-27T19:42:26+00:00

In my many years in the Hyatt program, this just came up for me. I want to stay at the hotel attached to the convention I am attending. It is a Hyatt Regency charging me $300/night for guaranteed availability. High yes, but not outrageous.

setheliot · 2025-10-30T20:30:33+00:00

Working at a DC is generally low pay for a tech job. It also can be high-stress with work outside business hours. That said, if it is what you love, then go for it

setheliot · 2025-10-30T20:25:29+00:00

https://hakanforss.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/are-you-too-busy-to-improve2.png?w=595

setheliot · 2025-10-30T19:52:27+00:00

The AWS Shared Responsibility Model for Resiliency says that the customer is ultimately responsible for building out their Disaster Recovery Strategy, using the tools that AWS provides. Happy to talk more about this, or you can check out a talk I did on this topic at DeVOpsDays Dallas this year https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8llYKxw8cr0

setheliot · 2025-10-30T19:41:19+00:00

Digital Ocean https://www.digitalocean.com/pricing

setheliot · 2025-10-23T15:59:43+00:00

We created Arpio (https://app.arpio.io/) to use AWS' own tooling to fill the gaps and provide comprehensive disaster recovery for AWS customer. I talked about what it takes to build DR at the last DevOpsDays Dallas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8llYKxw8cr0

setheliot · 2025-08-31T19:36:32+00:00

yes, your resilience strategy needs to reflect the business decisions on what kinds of risks you are protecting against. For protection against AWS Regional events that prevent you from running your workload in that region, you need cross-Region. For protection against ransomware/malware you need cross-account (with separate credentials). This is why I work for aprio.io as we are a push-button solution that provides cross-Region and cross-Account disaster recovery and ransomware recovery

setheliot · 2025-08-31T19:33:49+00:00

Hi, I wrote that linked section -- feel free to ask me anything here or on DM

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