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AWS charges money based on two different factors: space and time. We’ll see how these two factors relate to each other, and how to they compare to the price of buying and running your own computer.
New Terms:
- Space — Used in computer science to refer to the capacity or capability of a computer. A large hard drive has a lot of space. A computer that has a fast processor or fast network also has a lot of space.
- Time — Used in computer science to refer to the total time required to accomplish a task. Time can be split among many workers that accomplish the task simultaneously, but the total time required won’t be reduced.
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AWS can be very cheap or very expensive depending on how you use it.
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To understand pricing on AWS,
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we need to talk about two related concepts, space and time.
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Space is a measure of capacity or capability.
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For example, a computer with a large hard drive is capable of holding a lot of
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information, so we say it has a lot of space.
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But storage capacity isn't the only kind of capacity there is.
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What about processor capacity?
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A computer with a fast processor is capable of processing a lot of
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information.
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So we also say it has a lot of space, even if it has a small hard drive.
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There's also network capacity,
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which is how fast the computer is able to talk to other computers.
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We could say that a computer with a very fast network has a lot of space.
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Basically, you can think of space as a measure of how powerful a computer is.
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More powerful computers are capable of holding more stuff and doing more stuff.
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Then there's time.
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Time is a pretty straightforward concept.
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It's a measure of how long it takes to do something, but things get a bit
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more complicated when you have multiple actors working simultaneously.
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Let's say you need to stuff 60 envelopes and
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it takes a minute to stuff one envelope.
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Its going to take 60 minutes of work, right.
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Well, what if we have four people stuffing envelop simultaneously?
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Each person only has to stuff 15 envelops, so it takes 15 minutes.
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But the task hasn't gotten any smaller.
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It's still 60 minutes of work even if it only took 15 minutes of time on the clock.
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When we talk about time with computers, we're usually talking about the total work
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time added up across all the computers that are working on the task together.
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So how does all this relate to AWS?
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Anything that you do on AWS will require some amount of space,
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some amount of time, or both.
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The price you pay is based on space multiplied by time.
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In addition, you can usually trade space for time, at least to some degree.
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Let's take a look at an example to understand what this means.
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You and your friends are going on vacation and
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you'll all be staying at the Amazon Hotel.
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You need to decide how many rooms to book and
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how many nights you'll be staying at the hotel.
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At the Amazon hotel, you can book a regular room or a suite.
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A suite has more space, but it costs more money than a regular room.
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How do you make sure that you can stay at the hotel as long as possible
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while not paying too much money?
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You could all try to squeeze into one room.
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This means that you'll be able to stay at the Amazon hotel for
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a long time, because one room isn't very expensive.
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However, you're sacrificing space to get that extra time, and
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no one will sleep very well in that cramped space.
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Alternatively, everyone could get their own room, or
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even their own separate suite.
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Now, everyone has a lot of space, but that gets expensive quickly and
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you might only be able to afford one night at the hotel.
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Effectively, you're sacrificing time to get that extra space.
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The best approach is somewhere in the middle.
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A small number of rooms and suites, shared so that everyone has just enough space
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will make sure that you pay the minimum amount for the maximum benefit.
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