The Importance of the ETL Tool in AWS Database Migration

If you are looking for a cloud-based platform with almost unlimited storage capabilities, high-performing computing powers, and optimized content delivery, AWS (Amazon Web Service) should be your first choice. Each feature of AWS can be compartmentalized into separate silos for the convenience of businesses. One of the primary capabilities of AWS is facilitating database migration either from on-premises to the cloud or from one cloud provider to another and between relational databases, data warehouses, and NoSQL databases. The most optimized way to carry out all these functions is to use the AWS ETL tool.

ETL is the acronym for Extract, Transform, Load. It is mainly used to combine several databases or data warehouses into a single centralized data storage facility. The AWS ETL tool has three stages in its functioning. First, it extracts the data from the source database, transforms the data into a format that matches the architecture of the target database, and finally loads the processed data into the intended database. With the AWS ETL tool, the whole data migration function is fully automated and is not prone to human errors or data loss, resulting in high performance and cost efficiencies.

The following points prove why the AWS ETL tool is the preferred option for businesses for database migration.

· When migration is done with AWS ETL tool, businesses do not have to install and configure drivers and additional applications or make changes to the source database. The migration process is taken up directly through the AWS Management Console that replicates all changes and updates to the target database seamlessly through its Change Data Capture (CDC) feature.

· All changes and modifications in the source database are continually updated to the target database by the AWS ETL tool at pre-determined intervals. However, this is possible only when the source and the target databases are always kept synchronized. Further, database migration can be done with this tool without shutting down the source database. This is very convenient for large data-driven enterprises where any downtime upsetsoperating schedules.

· AWS supports all the common and popular databases used by businesses today. Hence, the AWS ETL tool handles all migration activities regardless of the architecture of the databases. These include both homogeneous and heterogeneous migration. In the first instance, the database engines, data structure, data type and code, and the schema structures of the source and the target databases are the same while in the second case, all are different.

· AWS ETL tool helps in migration of on-premises databases to Amazon RDS or Amazon EC2, Aurora, and databases running on EC2 to RDS or vice versa. Database migration is also possible between SQL, text-based data, and NoSQL with DMS AWS.

All these benefits of the AWS ETL tool prove that this is the ideal mode to migrate databases in the modern-day cloud-based business environment.