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Level 0 follows real requests through AWS, one step at a time. Three minutes on this page will make every graph easier to read.

1. How AWS is laid out

Everything you'll see sits inside these boxes. Each box is drawn the same way in every graph.

OrganizationAll of a company's AWS accounts, with one bill and shared guardrails.

AWS accountA container for resources. The strongest wall AWS has.

Global servicesBelong to no Region. Example: IAM, who can do what.

Region · us-east-1A place in the world with AWS data centres. Most things live in exactly one.

Public AWS servicesRun by AWS, reached over HTTPS: DynamoDB, SQS, S3, CloudWatch.

VPCYour own private network.

Public subnetHas a route to the internet. EC2 lives here.

Private subnetNo direct route to the internet. RDS lives here.

Small boxes are services. The coloured stripe says what kind (the key under each graph lists them).
Big boxes are places: accounts, Regions, VPCs, subnets. Something drawn inside a box lives there.
Faint lines are connections the request will use.
3The orange arrow is the current step, with its number and title on the graph.
4Red means refused, or what happens when something goes wrong.
→Next / Back or the arrow keys move through the steps. Click any step to jump to it.
abcUnderlined words open a plain-English definition.
{ }Show me the real thing reveals the actual JSON, SQL or HTTP. Optional.
Exam tips are SAA-C03 facts hiding in that step. Optional too.

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