Pause on Timed Test 1 reset questions but kept the timer

[karlhungus36]

I had to pause the timed test 1 to deal with an issue for about 2 minutes. Came back, hit resume and the test questions were reset (no answers are recorded) but the time still shows the 35 minutes gone that I was taking the test. I can’t even explain how annoyed I am right now… I am trying to figure out if these practice exams are just bad questions or if I just need to pay closer attention to the word games. That being said, if this is actually what the test from AWS is this validates absolutely nothing about ones skill level. Half of these questions are predicated on non-starter situations or ambiguity.

[Nikee-TutorialsDojo]

Hi Karlhungus36,

Thanks for raising this, and we’re really sorry about the frustration you experienced. The issue where your answers were reset but the timer continued is definitely not expected, and we’ll investigate this right away so it doesn’t disrupt your practice again.

Regarding the question style, the SAP Professional exam is a professional-level certification, and AWS designs its exams to be scenario-heavy, multi-layered, and occasionally ambiguous because they test judgment across complex architectures. They shouldn’t be predicated on unrealistic or “non-starter” situations, and our goal is to mirror AWS’s difficulty level without introducing confusion that doesn’t add value. If any item feels off, ambiguous, or not aligned with realistic AWS patterns, please report it — we take those seriously and review them promptly.

Thanks again for sharing your experience, and we appreciate your patience while we look into the test reset issue.

Regards,

Nikee @ Tutorials Dojo

[karlhungus36]

here is a question that I would consider wrong and does not make sense:

It is asking for: “Which of the following should the Solutions Architect do to effectively plan the cloud migration? (Select THREE.)”

It is saying the missed correct answer is: “Use AWS Migration Hub to discover and track the status of the application migration across AWS and partner solutions.”

The question very clearly indicates *plan* a cloud migration. “track the status of application migration” is not a planning operation, that indicates action has already been taken. This answer is a non-starter based on it negating the question criteria with a post planning action.

[Nikee-TutorialsDojo]

Hi Karl,

Thanks for bringing this up. Your interpretation is entirely understandable. The wording in Option 6 focuses on “tracking the status of application migration,” which suggests it occurs only after migration has started. That makes it easy to see why it feels out of place in a question specifically asking about planning.

However, according to AWS documentation, Migration Hub is also a planning tool, not just a tracking tool. AWS states that Migration Hub provides visibility into application inventories, server data, and dependencies discovered through AWS Application Discovery Service. All of this information is used during the planning stage to understand the current environment, group servers into migration waves, map dependencies, and estimate migration effort and cost.

In the scenario given, the company has thousands of servers, outdated documentation, and workloads spread across environments. Centralizing all discovery data in Migration Hub is a crucial step in building an accurate migration plan. That’s why it’s included in the correct set of answers, even though the phrasing emphasizes tracking rather than its planning capabilities.

Your feedback is valid, and we’ll revisit the question wording to make the Migration Hub’s planning role more straightforward and avoid confusion.

Regards,

Nikee @ Tutorials Dojo

[karlhungus36]

Sure, the migration hub tool has a planning feature… however, in the question you are explicitly stating that you “track the status of the application migration across AWS and partner solutions”.

My original concern remains… this is an incorrect based on the wording of actually using the planning feature of the tool. Just take those words out and the problem goes away….

[karlhungus36]

Here is another question that I would say the answer is just wrong…

The question states the database is running on an ec2 instance in the primary region. This means that in the backup region the database would also be on an ec2 instance. The “correct” answer indicates that all instances are scaled-down. In order for the database to replicate it would need to be in an up state. Scaled-down in this context could only mean it is on a reduced instance type. An autoscaling group would not apply here to the single database instance. Given the requirement of RTO of 5 min, it would be virtually impossible to fail over from the primary, stop the database, resize the instance, start it up all in under 5 mins. If your intention is that the database is not scaled down, you need to indicate as such or it makes the second answer correct not the third. I would even argue that the second question is phrased poorly since it doesn’t mention promotion of the database.

[Nikee-TutorialsDojo]

Hello Karl,

You’re absolutely right that a database replica must be running in the backup region for replication to occur. In AWS disaster-recovery terminology, Option 3 describes a warm-standby architecture. In a warm-standby design, the database is not “scaled down” to zero or stopped, it is running on a smaller instance type and continuously receiving asynchronous replication from the primary. AWS explicitly defines warm-standby as a fully functional, scaled-down environment in which key components (including the database) remain online. In this context, “scaled-down” applies only to the web and application tiers, which are deployed in small Auto Scaling groups behind ALBs. The database replica remains running because it must be up for continuous cross-region replication.

This is why Option 3 meets the RTO/RPO requirements. The RPO of 1 hour is satisfied because asynchronous cross-region replication is active. The RTO of 5 minutes is achievable because failover does not require resizing or stopping/starting the database instance—failover simply promotes or points the application to the already-running standby. The only scaling event during failover is the web and app layer, which Auto Scaling Groups can expand very quickly, while Route 53 flips traffic to the backup region. This aligns with AWS guidance that warm-standby is the most cost-efficient DR strategy for single-digit-minute RTO.

Option 2, in contrast, fails for the exact reason you mentioned: it requires vertical resizing of the standby database during a disaster. AWS vertical resizing of EC2 instances is not fast enough to guarantee a 5-minute RTO, especially for large DB instances. Because its database starts at a smaller size and must be manually resized during failover, Option 2 cannot meet the RTO requirement in practice, even though the phrasing may imply some replication is in place.

So while the question could be more straightforward about the database instance not being “scaled down” in the sense of being shut off, Option 3 is the only option that aligns with AWS’s documented warm-standby DR pattern, meets the 5-minute RTO and 1-hour RPO, avoids slow resizing operations, and keeps cost lower than a fully duplicated multi-region environment.

Regards,

Nikee @ Tutorials Dojo

[karlhungus36]

Hi Nikee, thanks for the reply. Unfortunately, this logic doesn’t actually make sense. If the database is significantly scaled down and you are failing over to it, one would assume that your traffic levels would also return to normal levels. Given the degraded database state you would be creating a situation where you will quickly have another outage. While the suggested correct action will accomplish an RTO of 5 minutes on paper, in reality it will just start to fail shortly after failover as traffic increases and web servers scale up. No one who actually wants to gracefully recover from a outage to another region would accept this. A slightly longer RTO and scaling up the database would be more appropriate. Or a hot standby. The increased RTO time would have to be balanced against the cost of running a hot standby vs warm which would be a decision for the business to make.

What good is an RTO of 5 minutes if it just starts failing shortly after recovery in the new region?

[karlhungus36]

Poorly phrased question again, indicates an “and” and the answers are an “or”.

Final part of question should read “Which of the following options *could* fix…”. The two correct answers accomplish the same thing which based on the questions phrasing causes you to doubt selecting an “or” and ultimately guess on a wrong answer.

[karlhungus36]

What is the actual point of this question? Again, it indicates an “and” condition in the phrasing… “Which of the following options should…”

The “correct” solution expects you to pick two answers that describe the same flow but slightly different? Why would you ever do that? Why not just have one answer? This is just confusing for the sake of being confusing… non-starter, based on broken logic of question.

[karlhungus36]

Huh? By accepting any of the answers for this question you are validating that the current pre-signed url scheme used to distribute files to all customers is somehow insecure. Again, if you are generating a pre-signed url for one customer why would it be any different for this customer? What is the relevance of them being in california? And if it is insecure, then you have a much bigger problem then getting a file to a single customer in California. I fail to see how creating a new bucket solves this issue. This question doesn’t make any sense.

[karlhungus36]

Here is another question that is phrased incorrectly:

What it is asking: “Which of the following actions should the solutions architect implement to improve the availability and load balancing of this cloud architecture? (Select TWO.)”

*should* in this context indicates an “and” condition… meaning you should select the two instances together that would solve this problem. The answers indicate an “or” condition which would be more appropriately referenced with the word *could*.

There is no scenario in which it would make sense to do both of these things at the same time.

This question is invalid right out of the gate since no combination of answers fulfill the implied “and” condition.

• This reply was modified 2 months, 1 week ago by  karlhungus36.

[Irene-TutorialsDojo]

Hello karlhungus36,

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. You’re absolutely right about the ambiguity in the question phrasing.

The use of “should” incorrectly implied that both answers needed to work together as complementary solutions, when in fact Options 1 and 5 are alternative approaches that wouldn’t be implemented simultaneously.

We have updated the question to use “could” instead of “should” to accurately reflect that these are valid alternative solutions rather than complementary actions.

We appreciate your feedback as it helps us improve the quality and clarity of our practice questions.

Best,

Irene @ Tutorials Dojo