Lab: Implementing AWS Cost Visibility and Governance

This lab provides hands-on experience in configuring cost optimization and visibility strategies as required for the AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Professional (SAP-C02) exam. You will implement resource tagging, set up budget alerts, and explore cost analysis tools.

[!WARNING] Remember to run the teardown commands at the end of this lab to avoid ongoing charges. Estimated cost for this lab is under $0.05 (mostly Free Tier eligible).

Prerequisites

An AWS Account with Administrator access.
AWS CLI installed and configured with credentials for your account.
Basic knowledge of JSON for CLI parameters.
IAM Permissions: Ensure your user has budgets:ModifyBudget, ce:*, s3:*, and sns:* permissions.

Learning Objectives

Implement a Tagging Strategy for cost allocation.
Configure AWS Budgets with SNS notifications for proactive cost management.
Use the AWS CLI to query cost and usage data from AWS Cost Explorer.
Identify Rightsizing Opportunities using AWS Compute Optimizer concepts.

Architecture Overview

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Step-by-Step Instructions

Step 1: Create a Tagged Resource

Before we can track costs by business unit, we need resources with standardized tags. We will create an S3 bucket with an Environment tag.

bash

# Generate a unique bucket name
BUCKET_NAME="brainybee-cost-lab-$(date +%s)"

aws s3api create-bucket --bucket $BUCKET_NAME --region us-east-1

aws s3api put-bucket-tagging --bucket $BUCKET_NAME --tagging 'TagSet=[{Key=Environment,Value=Dev},{Key=Project,Value=CostOptimization}]'

▶Console alternative

Navigate to the S3 Console.
Click Create bucket.
Enter a unique name and choose a region.
Under Tags, click Add tag and enter Key: Environment, Value: Dev.
Click Create bucket.

AWS Budgets requires a notification channel to alert you when thresholds are met.

bash

aws sns create-topic --name CostAlertTopic

# Note the TopicArn from the output. Replace <TOPIC_ARN> in the next step.
# Subscribe your email (Replace <YOUR_EMAIL>)
aws sns subscribe --topic-arn <TOPIC_ARN> --protocol email --notification-endpoint <YOUR_EMAIL>

Step 3: Create a Monthly Budget

We will create a monthly budget of $10.00 that triggers an alert at 80% of the forecasted amount.

bash

# Create a budget.json file
cat <<EOT > budget.json
{
    "BudgetName": "Monthly_Dev_Budget",
    "BudgetLimit": { "Amount": "10", "Unit": "USD" },
    "TimeUnit": "MONTHLY",
    "BudgetType": "COST"
}
EOT

aws budgets create-budget --account-id <YOUR_ACCOUNT_ID> --budget budget.json

[!TIP] In a real-world scenario, you would attach a notification to this budget via the create-notification command, linking it to the SNS Topic created in Step 2.

Step 4: Query Cost Explorer via CLI

To gain visibility, we can query our usage for the current month. Note that data may take 24 hours to appear in a new account.

bash

aws ce get-cost-and-usage \
    --time-period Start=$(date +%Y-%m-01),End=$(date +%Y-%m-%d) \
    --granularity MONTHLY \
    --metrics "UnblendedCost" \
    --group-by Type=DIMENSION,Key=SERVICE

Checkpoints

Task	Verification Command/Action	Expected Result
S3 Tagging	`aws s3api get-bucket-tagging --bucket <NAME>`	JSON showing `Environment=Dev`
SNS Topic	`aws sns list-topics`	Topic ARN for `CostAlertTopic` exists
Budget	`aws budgets describe-budgets --account-id <ID>`	`Monthly_Dev_Budget` listed in output

Troubleshooting

Problem	Cause	Fix
`AccessDenied`	IAM User lacks Billing permissions	Ensure the user has the `AdministratorAccess` or specific Billing policies.
Empty CE results	Data Latency	Cost Explorer data usually has a 24-hour delay for new resources.
SNS No Email	Subscription Not Confirmed	Check your email inbox (and spam) for the AWS Notification - Subscription Confirmation email.

Clean-Up / Teardown

[!IMPORTANT] Failure to delete these resources may result in minor charges if thresholds are exceeded.

bash

# 1. Delete the S3 Bucket (Empty it first if you added files)
aws s3 rb s3://<YOUR_BUCKET_NAME> --force

# 2. Delete the Budget
aws budgets delete-budget --account-id <YOUR_ACCOUNT_ID> --budget-name "Monthly_Dev_Budget"

# 3. Delete the SNS Topic
aws sns delete-topic --topic-arn <YOUR_TOPIC_ARN>

Stretch Challenge

Automated Rightsizing: Using the AWS CLI, try to find the command to list recommendations from AWS Compute Optimizer. How would you filter these recommendations to only show instances that are "Underprovisioned"?

▶Show Hint

Look into the aws compute-optimizer get-ec2-instance-recommendations command and use --filters.

Cost Estimate

S3: $0.023 per GB (First 5GB free). For this lab: $0.00.
AWS Budgets: First 2 budgets are free. For this lab: $0.00.
SNS: First 1 million Amazon SNS requests per month are free. For this lab: $0.00.
Total: $0.00 for most users.

Concept Review

Key Tools Comparison

Tool	Primary Use Case	Key Benefit
Cost Explorer	Visualizing historical and forecasted costs.	Trend analysis and filtering by tags.
AWS Budgets	Setting custom cost/usage limits.	Proactive alerts (SNS/Email).
Compute Optimizer	Rightsizing compute resources.	Uses ML to recommend instance types.
Trusted Advisor	General best practice checks.	Identifies idle or underutilized resources.

Optimization Strategy Visual

\begin{tikzpicture}[node distance=2cm] \draw[thick, ->] (0,0) -- (6,0) node[anchor=north] {Time/Lifecycle}; \draw[thick, ->] (0,0) -- (0,4) node[anchor=east] {Savings potential}; \draw[blue, thick] (0.5,3.5) .. controls (2,2) and (4,1) .. (5.5,0.5); \node at (3,2.5) {Rightsizing & Modernization}; \node[draw] at (3, -1) {\small Continuous Improvement Cycle}; \end{tikzpicture}

Lab: Implementing AWS Cost Visibility and Governance

Lab: Implementing AWS Cost Visibility and Governance

Prerequisites

Learning Objectives

Architecture Overview

Step-by-Step Instructions

Step 1: Create a Tagged Resource

Step 2: Create an SNS Topic for Cost Alerts

Step 3: Create a Monthly Budget

Step 4: Query Cost Explorer via CLI

Checkpoints

Troubleshooting

Clean-Up / Teardown

Stretch Challenge

Cost Estimate

Concept Review

Key Tools Comparison

Optimization Strategy Visual