Why use AWS instances?

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Author

Sarah Dowsland

Published

2024-03-05

Why use AWS instances when hosting a training course?

Using an AWS cloud instance to run a workshop has many benefits for you as a workshop organiser and for your course participants! It allows you to easily teach non-experts to do analyses on big data without them having to download software or data sets. You can run high performance computing workloads on instances, such as distributed analytics, machine learning algorithms, batch processing,and scientific modelling.

What is an instance?

You can consider it like having your own server machine in the cloud. Cloud-SPAN courses are taught inside a containerised instance, which is a virtual environment containing pre-loaded software and files. The instance runs on hardware borrowed from a commercial provider (in our case, Amazon Web Services; other providers are available).You are able to create and manage your own virtual server instance in the cloud computing environment. The Cloud-SPAN instructor workshop has been developed to guide you through how to configure and run the scripts to create and manage instances.

Advantages of using an instance

  • Convenient for participants Learners just have to log into the cloud instance, and they will have access to all of the required software and data. The learner doesn’t have to download any software or data sets.

  • Easier way to teach The instances all start out identical, so the file structure always looks the same which makes troubleshooting during a training course much easier!

  • Time efficient There isn’t any queuing for resources as the instances run on borrowed resources. This can save a lot of time for large analyses, and is especially useful for teaching.

Cloud-SPAN Instructor training course: How to Manage AWS Instances

Target Audience

This instructor training workshop is aimed at those who need or plan to manage similar cloud resources for training such as Research Software Engineers or Bioinformatics Unit Support Staff. While the module is focused on AWS, and particularly Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances, the scripts can be adapted for use with other cloud providers and other types of cloud services.

The workshop assumes no prior experience with the AWS concepts and tools covered but you will need experience of the Linux Terminal (Shell/Command Line Interface).

Programme

Learning objectives

  • how to configure and run the scripts to create and manage instances for workshops, manage late registrations and cancellations, and troubleshooting

  • how to create, manage and configure AMI templates (from which instances are created) with your own data and software analysis tools

  • how the scripts work so you can customise them.

Format

A Cloud-SPAN instructor will travel to your institution and deliver the 3 hour interactive workshop - free of charge.

Get in touch!

To schedule a workshop between March and May 2024, please contact us on cloud-span-project@york.ac.uk or view the website for further details.

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