Storing Historical Data On AWS
Tags: devops, sre, aws, cloudstorage
Published: 2023-05-01 05:35:03

## What is Historical Data

Historical data refers to information or data that has been collected and recorded from past events, transactions, or activities. It represents a record of the past and can be used for analysis, research, or reference purposes. Historical data can be collected from a variety of sources, including financial records, social media, weather data, government archives, and scientific research.

Historical data can be used for a wide range of purposes, such as:

1. Analysing trends and patterns: Historical data can provide insights into trends and patterns over time, which can help identify opportunities, risks, and areas for improvement. For example, analysing historical stock market data can help predict future market trends and inform investment decisions.

2. Forecasting future events: Historical data can be used to forecast future events based on past patterns and trends. For example, weather data can be used to predict future weather conditions and inform decisions related to agriculture, transportation, and emergency planning.

3. Evaluating performance: Historical data can be used to evaluate the performance of individuals, organisations, or systems over time. For example, analysing historical sales data can help identify areas for improvement in sales performance.

4. Research and analysis: Historical data can be used for research and analysis purposes in various fields, such as economics, social sciences, and environmental studies. For example, analysing historical population data can help understand demographic trends and inform policy decisions.

It is important to note that historical data can become less relevant over time as conditions and circumstances change. Therefore, it is essential to keep the data up-to-date and relevant to the current situation. Additionally, the quality and accuracy of historical data can vary depending on the source and collection methods. Therefore, it is important to verify the data before using it for decision-making purposes.


## Challenges of storing historical data

Storing historical data poses several challenges, including:

1. Storage capacity: Historical data is often voluminous, and storing it can quickly become a challenge. As data continues to accumulate over time, organisations may need to invest in additional storage infrastructure to accommodate the growing volume of data. Moreover, the cost of storing and managing historical data can become prohibitively high.

2. Data quality: Historical data can be prone to errors, inconsistencies, and data degradation over time. Data quality issues can arise due to changes in data formats, technology upgrades, and human errors during data entry. As a result, historical data may require cleaning, standardisation, and normalisation to ensure its accuracy and usefulness.

3. Security and privacy: Historical data may contain sensitive or personal information, and storing it securely can be a challenge. Organisations need to ensure that historical data is protected from unauthorised access, theft, and data breaches. Additionally, organisations need to comply with data protection regulations, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which impose strict requirements for the storage and management of personal data.

4. Data accessibility and retrieval: Retrieving historical data can be a challenge, especially if the data is stored in multiple formats and locations. Organisations may need to invest in data retrieval tools and technologies to ensure timely and efficient access to historical data. Additionally, retrieving historical data may require specialised skills and expertise, such as data analysis and data science.

5. Data retention policies: Organisations may need to comply with legal and regulatory requirements regarding the retention of historical data. These requirements may specify the length of time that data must be retained, the type of data that must be retained, and the format in which the data must be stored. As a result, organisations may need to implement data retention policies that are compliant with applicable laws and regulations.

6. Data migration: Historical data may need to be migrated from legacy systems to new platforms or formats. Data migration can be a complex and time-consuming process, and it requires careful planning and execution to ensure the integrity and accuracy of the data.

## How AWS can come to the rescue

AWS offers several services that can help organisations deal with the challenges of storing historical data. Here are some examples:

1. Storage capacity: AWS offers a range of storage services, including Amazon S3, Amazon EBS, and Amazon Glacier. These services provide scalable, durable, and cost-effective storage solutions that can accommodate large volumes of historical data. Amazon S3 is a highly available and scalable object storage service that can store and retrieve any amount of data from anywhere on the web. Amazon EBS provides block-level storage volumes that can be attached to Amazon EC2 instances, while Amazon Glacier offers low-cost archival storage for infrequently accessed data.

2. Data quality: AWS offers a range of data management and processing services, including Amazon EMR, AWS Glue, and Amazon Redshift. These services can help clean, standardise, and normalise historical data to ensure its accuracy and usefulness. Amazon EMR is a managed Hadoop framework that can process large amounts of data using popular distributed computing tools, such as Apache Spark and Hive. AWS Glue is a fully managed extract, transform, and load (ETL) service that can automate the process of cleaning and transforming data. Amazon Redshift is a fully managed data warehouse service that can handle petabyte-scale data warehousing workloads.

3. Security and privacy: AWS provides a range of security and compliance services, including AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM), Amazon Inspector, and AWS Key Management Service (KMS). These services can help organisations protect their historical data from unauthorised access, theft, and data breaches. AWS IAM allows organisations to manage access to AWS services and resources securely. Amazon Inspector can help identify security vulnerabilities in AWS resources, while AWS KMS provides a managed service to create and control the encryption keys used to encrypt data.

4. Data accessibility and retrieval: AWS provides several tools and services that can help organisations retrieve and analyse historical data, including Amazon Athena, Amazon Redshift Spectrum, and Amazon QuickSight. Amazon Athena is a serverless interactive query service that allows organisations to analyse data in Amazon S3 using standard SQL. Amazon Redshift Spectrum extends the functionality of Amazon Redshift by allowing organisations to analyse data in Amazon S3 directly. Amazon QuickSight is a cloud-based business intelligence service that can visualise and analyse data from a variety of sources, including historical data.

5. Data retention policies: AWS offers several compliance services, including AWS Artifact, AWS Config, and AWS CloudTrail, that can help organisations comply with data retention policies. AWS Artifact provides on-demand access to AWS compliance reports, while AWS Config allows organisations to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of their AWS resources. AWS CloudTrail provides a record of actions taken in AWS, including API calls, and can help organisations track and manage their historical data.

6. Data migration: AWS provides several migration services, including AWS Database Migration Service (DMS) and AWS Snowball, that can help organisations migrate historical data from legacy systems to AWS. AWS DMS is a managed service that can migrate databases to AWS quickly and securely, while AWS Snowball is a petabyte-scale data transfer service that can help organisations transfer large amounts of data to and from AWS.

## AWS services that can be used to store historical data

Storing historical data on AWS (Amazon Web Services) involves using various services provided by AWS to store and manage the data. AWS provides a range of storage services to cater to different types of data and workloads. Here are some of the key AWS services that can be used for storing historical data:

1. Amazon S3 (Simple Storage Service): This is a highly scalable and durable object storage service that can be used to store any type of data, including historical data. Amazon S3 is designed for 99.999999999% durability, which means that data stored on S3 is highly resilient to failures. S3 also provides various options to manage access to the stored data and to protect it using encryption and access controls.

2. Amazon Glacier: This is a low-cost, secure, and durable storage service that is designed for data archiving and long-term retention of historical data. Glacier provides a range of options for accessing and retrieving archived data, including expedited, standard, and bulk retrieval options.

3. Amazon EBS (Elastic Block Store): This is a block-level storage service that provides persistent storage for EC2 instances. EBS volumes can be used to store historical data that needs to be accessed frequently by EC2 instances. EBS volumes can be attached and detached from EC2 instances as needed, and can be backed up and restored using snapshots.

4. Amazon RDS (Relational Database Service): This is a managed database service that can be used to store historical data in a structured format. RDS supports a range of database engines, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, and SQL Server. RDS provides automated backups, point-in-time recovery, and multi-AZ replication for high availability.

5. Amazon DynamoDB: This is a NoSQL database service that can be used to store unstructured and semi-structured historical data. DynamoDB is designed for high scalability and low-latency access to data. DynamoDB provides automatic scaling, backup and restore, and data replication across multiple regions.

## Best practices for reducing cost when storing historical data on AWS

To reduce the cost of storing historical data on AWS, here are some best practices:

1. Choose the right storage class: AWS offers several storage classes, each with different performance and durability characteristics. By choosing the right storage class based on the frequency of access and the desired durability of the data, organisations can optimise the cost of storing historical data.

2. Use lifecycle policies: AWS S3 and Glacier support lifecycle policies that can automatically transition objects between storage classes or delete them based on certain criteria, such as age or object size. By using lifecycle policies, organisations can optimise the cost of storing historical data by moving infrequently accessed data to lower-cost storage classes or deleting data that is no longer needed.

3. Compress data: Compressing data before storing it on AWS can reduce storage costs by reducing the amount of data that needs to be stored. AWS S3 and Glacier support several compression formats, such as GZIP and ZIP, that can be used to compress data before storing it.

4. Use serverless computing: AWS provides several serverless computing services, such as AWS Lambda and AWS Glue, that can be used to process historical data without the need for dedicated servers. By using serverless computing, organisations can reduce the cost of processing and analysing historical data.

5. Monitor and optimise: AWS provides several monitoring and optimisation tools, such as AWS Cost Explorer and AWS Trusted Advisor, that can be used to monitor and optimise the cost of storing historical data. By regularly reviewing and optimising storage usage, organisations can identify opportunities to reduce costs and improve efficiency.