Amazon DynamoDB is a fully managed NoSQL database service for applications that need consistent, single-digit millisecond latency at any scale. This talk explores DynamoDB capabilities and benefits in detail and discusses how to get the most out of your DynamoDB database. We go over schema design best practices with DynamoDB across multiple use cases, including gaming, AdTech, IoT, and others. We also explore designing efficient indexes, scanning, and querying, and go into detail on a number of recently released features, including JSON document support, Streams, and more.

1. © 2015, Amazon Web Services, Inc. or its Affiliates. All rights reserved.
Rick Houlihan
Principal Solutions Architect
Amazon Web Services
October 2015
Deep Dive: Amazon DynamoDB
DAT401

2. What to expect from the session
• Tables, API, data types, indexes
• Scaling
• Data modeling
• Scenarios and best practices
• DynamoDB Streams
• Reference architecture

3. Why NoSQL?
Optimized for storage Optimized for compute
Normalized/relational Denormalized/hierarchical
Ad hoc queries Instantiated views
Scale vertically Scale horizontally
Yesterday’s solution Built for today’s apps
SQL NoSQL

4. Amazon DynamoDB
Fast and Consistent
Scales to Any WorkloadDocument or Key-ValueFully Managed NoSQL
Event Driven ProgrammingAccess Control

5. Tables, API, Data Types

6. Table and item API
DynamoDB
ListStreams
DescribeStream
GetShardIterator
GetRecords
Streams API
Admin CRUD
Create Table Put/Get Item
Update Table Batch Put/Get Item
Delete Table Update Item
Describe Table Delete Item
Query
Scan

7. Data types
String (S)
Number (N)
Binary (B)
String Set (SS)
Number Set (NS)
Binary Set (BS)
Boolean (BOOL)
Null (NULL)
List (L)
Map (M)
Used for storing nested JSON documents

8. Table
Table
Items
Attributes
Hash
Key
Range
Key
Mandatory
Key-value access pattern
Determines data distribution Optional
Model 1:N relationships
Enables rich query capabilities
All items for a hash key
==, <, >, >=, <=
“begins with”
“between”
sorted results
counts
top/bottom N values
paged responses

9. 00 FF00 55 A954 AA FF
Hash table
Hash key uniquely identifies an item
Hash key is used for building an unordered hash index
Table can be partitioned for scale
Id = 1
Name = Jim
Hash (1) = 7B
Id = 2
Name = Andy
Dept = Eng
Hash (2) = 48
Id = 3
Name = Kim
Dept = Ops
Hash (3) = CD
Key Space

10. Hash-range table
Hash key and range key together uniquely identify an Item
Within unordered hash index, data is sorted by the range key
No limit on the number of items (∞) per hash key
• Except if you have local secondary indexes
00:0 FF:∞
Hash (2) = 48
Customer# = 2
Order# = 10
Item = Pen
Customer# = 2
Order# = 11
Item = Shoes
Customer# = 1
Order# = 10
Item = Toy
Customer# = 1
Order# = 11
Item = Boots
Hash (1) = 7B
Customer# = 3
Order# = 10
Item = Book
Customer# = 3
Order# = 11
Item = Paper
Hash (3) = CD
55 A9:∞54:∞ AA
Partition 1 Partition 2 Partition 3

11. Partitions are three-way replicated
Id = 2
Name = Andy
Dept = Engg
Id = 3
Name = Kim
Dept = Ops
Id = 1
Name = Jim
Id = 2
Name = Andy
Dept = Engg
Id = 3
Name = Kim
Dept = Ops
Id = 1
Name = Jim
Id = 2
Name = Andy
Dept = Engg
Id = 3
Name = Kim
Dept = Ops
Id = 1
Name = Jim
Replica 1
Replica 2
Replica 3
Partition 1 Partition 2 Partition N

12. Indexes

13. Local secondary index (LSI)
Alternate range key attribute
Index is local to a hash key (or partition)
A1
(hash)
A3
(range)
A2
(table key)
A1
(hash)
A2
(range)
A3 A4 A5
LSIs A1
(hash)
A4
(range)
A2
(table key)
A3
(projected)
Table
KEYS_ONLY
INCLUDE A3
A1
(hash)
A5
(range)
A2
(table key)
A3
(projected)
A4
(projected)
ALL
10 GB max per hash
key, i.e. LSIs limit the
# of range keys!

14. Global secondary index (GSI)
Alternate hash (+range) key
Index is across all table hash keys (partitions)
A1
(hash)
A2 A3 A4 A5
GSIs A5
(hash)
A4
(range)
A1
(table key)
A3
(projected)
Table
INCLUDE A3
A4
(hash)
A5
(range)
A1
(table key)
A2
(projected)
A3
(projected) ALL
A2
(hash)
A1
(table key) KEYS_ONLY
RCUs/WCUs
provisioned separately
for GSIs
Online indexing

15. How do GSI updates work?
Table
Primary
table
Primary
table
Primary
table
Primary
table
Global
Secondary
Index
Client
2. Asynchronous
update (in progress)
If GSIs don’t have enough write capacity, table writes will be throttled!

16. LSI or GSI?
LSI can be modeled as a GSI
If data size in an item collection > 10 GB, use GSI
If eventual consistency is okay for your scenario, use
GSI!

17. Scaling

18. Scaling
Throughput
• Provision any amount of throughput to a table
Size
• Add any number of items to a table
• Max item size is 400 KB
• LSIs limit the number of range keys due to 10 GB limit
Scaling is achieved through partitioning

19. Throughput
Provisioned at the table level
• Write capacity units (WCUs) are measured in 1 KB per second
• Read capacity units (RCUs) are measured in 4 KB per second
• RCUs measure strictly consistent reads
• Eventually consistent reads cost 1/2 of consistent reads
Read and write throughput limits are independent
WCURCU

20. Partitioning math
In the future, these details might change…
Number of Partitions
By Capacity (Total RCU / 3000) + (Total WCU / 1000)
By Size Total Size / 10 GB
Total Partitions CEILING(MAX (Capacity, Size))

21. Partitioning example Table size = 8 GB, RCUs = 5000, WCUs = 500
RCUs per partition = 5000/3 = 1666.67
WCUs per partition = 500/3 = 166.67
Data/partition = 10/3 = 3.33 GB
RCUs and WCUs are uniformly
spread across partitions
Number of Partitions
By Capacity (5000 / 3000) + (500 / 1000) = 2.17
By Size 8 / 10 = 0.8
Total Partitions CEILING(MAX (2.17, 0.8)) = 3

22. Example: hot keys
Partition
Time
Heat

23. Example: periodic spike

24. Getting the most out of DynamoDB throughput
“To get the most out of DynamoDB
throughput, create tables where
the hash key element has a large
number of distinct values, and
values are requested fairly
uniformly, as randomly as
possible.”
—DynamoDB Developer Guide
Space: access is evenly spread
over the key-space
Time: requests arrive evenly
spaced in time

25. How does DynamoDB handle bursts?
DynamoDB saves 300 seconds of unused capacity per
partition
This is used when a partition runs out of provisioned
throughput due to bursts
• Provided excess capacity is available at the node

26. Burst capacity is built-in
0
400
800
1200
1600
CapacityUnits
Time
Provisioned Consumed
“Save up” unused capacity
Consume saved up capacity
Burst capacity: 300 seconds
(1200 × 300 = 3600 CU)

27. Burst capacity may not be sufficient
0
400
800
1200
1600
CapacityUnits
Time
Provisioned Consumed Attempted
Burst capacity: 300 seconds
(1200 × 300 = 3600 CU)
Throttled requests
Don’t completely depend on burst capacity… provision sufficient throughput

28. What causes throttling?
If sustained throughput goes beyond provisioned throughput per partition
Non-uniform workloads
• Hot keys/hot partitions
• Very large bursts
Mixing hot data with cold data
• Use a table per time period
From the example before:
• Table created with 5000 RCUs, 500 WCUs
• RCUs per partition = 1666.67
• WCUs per partition = 166.67
• If sustained throughput > (1666 RCUs or 166 WCUs) per key or partition,
DynamoDB may throttle requests
• Solution: Increase provisioned throughput

29. Table examples
case class CameraRecord(
cameraId: Int, // hash key
ownerId: Int,
subscribers: Set[Int],
hoursOfRecording: Int,
...
)
case class Cuepoint(
cameraId: Int, // hash key
timestamp: Long, // range key
type: String,
...
)HashKey RangeKey Value
Key Segment 1234554343254
Key Segment1 1231231433235

30. Data modeling

31. 1:1 relationships or key-values
Use a table or GSI with a hash key
Use GetItem or BatchGetItem API
Example: Given an SSN or license number, get attributes
Users Table
Hash key Attributes
SSN = 123-45-6789 Email = johndoe@nowhere.com, License = TDL25478134
SSN = 987-65-4321 Email = maryfowler@somewhere.com, License = TDL78309234
Users-Email-GSI
Hash key Attributes
License = TDL78309234 Email = maryfowler@somewhere.com, SSN = 987-65-4321
License = TDL25478134 Email = johndoe@nowhere.com, SSN = 123-45-6789

32. 1:N relationships or parent-children
Use a table or GSI with hash and range key
Use Query API
Example:
• Given a device, find all readings between epoch X, Y
Device-measurements
Hash Key Range key Attributes
DeviceId = 1 epoch = 5513A97C Temperature = 30, pressure = 90
DeviceId = 1 epoch = 5513A9DB Temperature = 30, pressure = 90

33. N:M relationships
Use a table and GSI with hash and range key elements
switched
Use Query API
Example: Given a user, find all games. Or given a game,
find all users.
User-Games-Table
Hash Key Range key
UserId = bob GameId = Game1
UserId = fred GameId = Game2
UserId = bob GameId = Game3
Game-Users-GSI
Hash Key Range key
GameId = Game1 UserId = bob
GameId = Game2 UserId = fred
GameId = Game3 UserId = bob

34. Documents (JSON)
New data types (M, L, BOOL,
NULL) introduced to support
JSON
Document SDKs
• Simple programming model
• Conversion to/from JSON
• Java, JavaScript, Ruby, .NET
Cannot index (S,N) elements
of a JSON object stored in M
• Only top-level table attributes
can be used in LSIs and GSIs
without Streams/Lambda
JavaScript DynamoDB
string S
number N
boolean BOOL
null NULL
array L
object M

35. Rich expressions
Projection expression
• Query/Get/Scan: ProductReviews.FiveStar[0]
Filter expression
• Query/Scan: #VIEWS > :num
Conditional expression
• Put/Update/DeleteItem: attribute_not_exists (#pr.FiveStar)
Update expression
• UpdateItem: set Replies = Replies + :num

36. Scenarios and best practices

37. Event logging
Storing time series data

38. Time series tables
Events_table_2015_April
Event_id
(Hash key)
Timestamp
(range key)
Attribute1 …. Attribute N
Events_table_2015_March
Event_id
(Hash key)
Timestamp
(range key)
Attribute1 …. Attribute N
Events_table_2015_Feburary
Event_id
(Hash key)
Timestamp
(range key)
Attribute1 …. Attribute N
Events_table_2015_January
Event_id
(Hash key)
Timestamp
(range key)
Attribute1 …. Attribute N
RCUs = 1000
WCUs = 100
RCUs = 10000
WCUs = 10000
RCUs = 100
WCUs = 1
RCUs = 10
WCUs = 1
Current table
Older tables
HotdataColddata
Don’t mix hot and cold data; archive cold data to Amazon S3

39. Dealing with time series data
Use a table per time period
Pre-create daily, weekly, monthly tables
Provision required throughput for current table
Writes go to the current table
Turn off (or reduce) throughput for older tables

40. Product catalog
Popular items (read)

41. Partition 1
2000 RCUs
Partition K
2000 RCUs
Partition M
2000 RCUs
Partition 50
2000 RCU
Scaling bottlenecks
Product A Product B
Shoppers
ProductCatalog Table
SELECT Id, Description, ...
FROM ProductCatalog
WHERE Id="POPULAR_PRODUCT"

42. RequestsPerSecond
Item Primary Key
Request Distribution Per Hash Key
DynamoDB Requests

43. Partition 1 Partition 2
ProductCatalog Table
User
DynamoDB
User
Cache
popular items
SELECT Id, Description, ...
FROM ProductCatalog
WHERE Id="POPULAR_PRODUCT"

44. RequestsPerSecond
Item Primary Key
Request Distribution Per Hash Key
DynamoDB Requests Cache Hits

45. Messaging app
Large items
Filters vs. indexes
M:N Modeling—inbox and outbox

46. Messages
Table
Messages App
David
SELECT *
FROM Messages
WHERE Recipient='David'
LIMIT 50
ORDER BY Date DESC
Inbox
SELECT *
FROM Messages
WHERE Sender ='David'
LIMIT 50
ORDER BY Date DESC
Outbox

47. Recipient Date Sender Message
David 2014-10-02 Bob …
… 48 more messages for David …
David 2014-10-03 Alice …
Alice 2014-09-28 Bob …
Alice 2014-10-01 Carol …
Large and small attributes mixed
(Many more messages)
David
Messages Table
50 items × 256 KB each
Hash key Range key
Large message bodies
Attachments
SELECT *
FROM Messages
WHERE Recipient='David'
LIMIT 50
ORDER BY Date DESC
Inbox

48. Computing inbox query cost
Items evaluated by query
Average item size
Conversion ratio
Eventually consistent reads
50 * 256KB * (1 RCU / 4KB) * (1 / 2) = 1600 RCU

49. Recipient Date Sender Subject MsgId
David 2014-10-02 Bob Hi!… afed
David 2014-10-03 Alice RE: The… 3kf8
Alice 2014-09-28 Bob FW: Ok… 9d2b
Alice 2014-10-01 Carol Hi!... ct7r
Separate the bulk data
Inbox-GSI Messages Table
MsgId Body
9d2b …
3kf8 …
ct7r …
afed …
David
1. Query Inbox-GSI: 1 RCU
2. BatchGetItem Messages: 1600 RCU
(50 separate items at 256 KB)
(50 sequential items at 128 bytes)
Uniformly distributes large item reads

50. Inbox GSI
Define which attributes to copy into the index

51. Outbox Sender
Outbox GSI
SELECT *
FROM Messages
WHERE Sender ='David'
LIMIT 50
ORDER BY Date DESC

52. Messaging app
Messages
Table
David
Inbox
Global secondary
index
Inbox
Outbox
Global secondary
index
Outbox

53. Reduce one-to-many item sizes
Configure secondary index projections
Use GSIs to model M:N relationship
between sender and recipient
Distribute large items
Querying many large items at once
InboxMessagesOutbox

54. Multiplayer online gaming
Query filters vs.
composite key indexes

55. GameId Date Host Opponent Status
d9bl3 2014-10-02 David Alice DONE
72f49 2014-09-30 Alice Bob PENDING
o2pnb 2014-10-08 Bob Carol IN_PROGRESS
b932s 2014-10-03 Carol Bob PENDING
ef9ca 2014-10-03 David Bob IN_PROGRESS
Games Table
Multiplayer online game data
Hash key

56. Query for incoming game requests
DynamoDB indexes provide hash and range
What about queries for two equalities and a range?
SELECT * FROM Game
WHERE Opponent='Bob‘
AND Status=‘PENDING'
ORDER BY Date DESC
(hash)
(range)
(?)

57. Secondary Index
Opponent Date GameId Status Host
Alice 2014-10-02 d9bl3 DONE David
Carol 2014-10-08 o2pnb IN_PROGRESS Bob
Bob 2014-09-30 72f49 PENDING Alice
Bob 2014-10-03 b932s PENDING Carol
Bob 2014-10-03 ef9ca IN_PROGRESS David
Approach 1: Query filter
BobHash key Range key

58. Secondary Index
Approach 1: query filter
Bob
Opponent Date GameId Status Host
Alice 2014-10-02 d9bl3 DONE David
Carol 2014-10-08 o2pnb IN_PROGRESS Bob
Bob 2014-09-30 72f49 PENDING Alice
Bob 2014-10-03 b932s PENDING Carol
Bob 2014-10-03 ef9ca IN_PROGRESS David
SELECT * FROM Game
WHERE Opponent='Bob'
ORDER BY Date DESC
FILTER ON Status='PENDING'
(filtered out)

59. Needle in a haystack
Bob

60. Send back less data “on the wire”
Simplify application code
Simple SQL-like expressions
• AND, OR, NOT, ()
Use query filter
Your index isn’t entirely selective

61. Approach 2: composite key
StatusDate
DONE_2014-10-02
IN_PROGRESS_2014-10-08
IN_PROGRESS_2014-10-03
PENDING_2014-09-30
PENDING_2014-10-03
Status
DONE
IN_PROGRESS
IN_PROGRESS
PENDING
PENDING
Date
2014-10-02
2014-10-08
2014-10-03
2014-10-03
2014-09-30
+ =

62. Secondary Index
Approach 2: composite key
Opponent StatusDate GameId Host
Alice DONE_2014-10-02 d9bl3 David
Carol IN_PROGRESS_2014-10-08 o2pnb Bob
Bob IN_PROGRESS_2014-10-03 ef9ca David
Bob PENDING_2014-09-30 72f49 Alice
Bob PENDING_2014-10-03 b932s Carol
Hash key Range key

63. Opponent StatusDate GameId Host
Alice DONE_2014-10-02 d9bl3 David
Carol IN_PROGRESS_2014-10-08 o2pnb Bob
Bob IN_PROGRESS_2014-10-03 ef9ca David
Bob PENDING_2014-09-30 72f49 Alice
Bob PENDING_2014-10-03 b932s Carol
Secondary Index
Approach 2: composite key
Bob
SELECT * FROM Game
WHERE Opponent='Bob'
AND StatusDate BEGINS_WITH 'PENDING'

64. Needle in a sorted haystack
Bob

65. Sparse indexes
Id
(Hash)
User Game Score Date Award
1 Bob G1 1300 2012-12-23
2 Bob G1 1450 2012-12-23
3 Jay G1 1600 2012-12-24
4 Mary G1 2000 2012-10-24 Champ
5 Ryan G2 123 2012-03-10
6 Jones G2 345 2012-03-20
Game-scores-table
Award
(Hash)
Id User Score
Champ 4 Mary 2000
Award-GSI
Scan sparse hash GSIs

66. Concatenate attributes to form useful
secondary index keys
Take advantage of sparse indexes
Replace filter with indexes
You want to optimize a query as much
as possible
Status + Date

67. Real-Time voting
Write-heavy items

68. Requirements for voting
Allow each person to vote only once
No changing votes
Real-time aggregation
Voter analytics, demographics

69. Real-time voting architecture
AggregateVotes
Table
Voters
RawVotes Table
Voting App

70. Partition 1
1000 WCUs
Partition K
1000 WCUs
Partition M
1000 WCUs
Partition N
1000 WCUs
Votes Table
Candidate A Candidate B
Scaling bottlenecks
Voters
Provision 200,000 WCUs

71. Write sharding
Candidate A_2
Candidate B_1
Candidate B_2
Candidate B_3
Candidate B_5
Candidate B_4
Candidate B_7
Candidate B_6
Candidate A_1
Candidate A_3
Candidate A_4
Candidate A_7 Candidate B_8
Candidate A_6 Candidate A_8
Candidate A_5
Voter
Votes Table

72. Write sharding
Candidate A_2
Candidate B_1
Candidate B_2
Candidate B_3
Candidate B_5
Candidate B_4
Candidate B_7
Candidate B_6
Candidate A_1
Candidate A_3
Candidate A_4
Candidate A_7 Candidate B_8
UpdateItem: “CandidateA_” + rand(0, 10)
ADD 1 to Votes
Candidate A_6 Candidate A_8
Candidate A_5
Voter
Votes Table

73. Votes Table
Shard aggregation
Candidate A_2
Candidate B_1
Candidate B_2
Candidate B_3
Candidate B_5
Candidate B_4
Candidate B_7
Candidate B_6
Candidate A_1
Candidate A_3
Candidate A_4
Candidate A_5
Candidate A_6 Candidate A_8
Candidate A_7 Candidate B_8
Periodic
Process
Candidate A
Total: 2.5M
1. Sum
2. Store Voter

74. Trade off read cost for write scalability
Consider throughput per hash key and per partition
Shard write-heavy hash keys
Your write workload is not horizontally
scalable

75. Correctness in voting
UserId Candidate Date
Alice A 2013-10-02
Bob B 2013-10-02
Eve B 2013-10-02
Chuck A 2013-10-02
RawVotes Table
Segment Votes
A_1 23
B_2 12
B_1 14
A_2 25
AggregateVotes Table
Voter
1. Record vote and de-dupe; retry 2. Increment candidate counter

76. Correctness in aggregation?
UserId Candidate Date
Alice A 2013-10-02
Bob B 2013-10-02
Eve B 2013-10-02
Chuck A 2013-10-02
RawVotes Table
Segment Votes
A_1 23
B_2 12
B_1 14
A_2 25
AggregateVotes Table
Voter

77. DynamoDB Streams

78. Stream of updates to a table
Asynchronous
Exactly once
Strictly ordered
• Per item
Highly durable
• Scale with table
24-hour lifetime
Sub-second latency
DynamoDB Streams

79. View Type Destination
Old image—before update Name = John, Destination = Mars
New image—after update Name = John, Destination = Pluto
Old and new images Name = John, Destination = Mars
Name = John, Destination = Pluto
Keys only Name = John
View types
UpdateItem (Name = John, Destination = Pluto)

80. Stream
Table
Partition 1
Partition 2
Partition 3
Partition 4
Partition 5
Table
Shard 1
Shard 2
Shard 3
Shard 4
KCL
Worker
KCL
Worker
KCL
Worker
KCL
Worker
Amazon Kinesis Client
Library Application
DynamoDB
Client Application
Updates
DynamoDB Streams and
Amazon Kinesis Client Library

81. DynamoDB Streams
Open Source Cross-
Region Replication Library
Asia Pacific (Sydney) EU (Ireland) Replica
US East (N. Virginia)
Cross-region replication

82. DynamoDB Streams and AWS Lambda

83. Triggers

84. Real-time voting architecture (improved)
AggregateVotes
Table
Amazon
Redshift Amazon EMR
Your
Amazon Kinesis–
Enabled App
Voters RawVotes TableVoting App RawVotes
DynamoDB
Stream

85. Real-time voting architecture
AggregateVotes
Table
Amazon
Redshift Amazon EMR
Your
Amazon Kinesis-
Enabled App
Voters RawVotes TableVoting App RawVotes
DynamoDB
Stream
Handle any scale of
election

86. Real-time voting architecture
AggregateVotes
Table
Amazon
Redshift Amazon EMR
Your
Amazon Kinesis-
Enabled app
Voters RawVotes TableVoting App RawVotes
DynamoDB
Stream
Vote only once,
no changing votes

87. Real-time voting architecture
AggregateVotes
Table
Amazon
Redshift Amazon EMR
Your
Amazon Kinesis–
Enabled App
Voters RawVotes TableVoting app RawVotes
DynamoDB
Stream
Real-time, fault-tolerant,
scalable aggregation

88. Real-time voting architecture
AggregateVotes
Table
Amazon
Redshift Amazon EMR
Your
Amazon Kinesis–
Enabled App
Voters RawVotes TableVoting app RawVotes
DynamoDB
Stream
Voter analytics, statistics

89. Analytics with
DynamoDB Streams
Collect and de-dupe data in DynamoDB
Aggregate data in-memory and flush periodically
Performing real-time aggregation and
analytics

90. Architecture

91. Reference Architecture

92. Thank you!