Assignment

The Nautilus DevOps team needs to set up a DynamoDB table for storing user data. They need to create a DynamoDB table with the following specifications:

The table name should be nautilus-users.
The primary key should be nautilus_id (String).
The table should use PAY_PER_REQUEST billing mode.

Use Terraform to create this DynamoDB table. The Terraform working directory is /home/bob/terraform. Create the main.tf file (do not create a different .tf file) to create the DynamoDB table.

Note: Right-click under the EXPLORER section in VS Code and select Open in Integrated Terminal to launch the terminal.

Solution

DynamoDB Table — `nautilus-users`

Terraform solution to create an on-demand DynamoDB table keyed on a string partition key.

`main.tf`

terraform {
  required_providers {
    aws = {
      source  = "hashicorp/aws"
      version = "~> 6.0"
    }
  }
}

provider "aws" {
  region = "us-east-1"
}

resource "aws_dynamodb_table" "nautilus_users" {
  name         = "nautilus-users"
  billing_mode = "PAY_PER_REQUEST"
  hash_key     = "nautilus_id"

  attribute {
    name = "nautilus_id"
    type = "S"
  }
}

How to run

cd /home/bob/terraform
terraform init
terraform apply -auto-approve

How it works

`aws_dynamodb_table`

A single resource provisions the whole table.

name = "nautilus-users" — the table name, exactly as required.
hash_key = "nautilus_id" — sets the table's partition key (DynamoDB's API calls it the "hash key"). This is the primary key the task asks for. No range_key is defined, so nautilus_id alone uniquely identifies each item — a simple primary key rather than a composite one.
attribute block — this is the part people forget. DynamoDB is schemaless for non-key fields, so you only ever declare attributes that participate in a key (partition key, sort key, or an index key). Here nautilus_id is the partition key, so it must be declared with its type. type = "S" marks it as a String (the valid types are S string, N number, B binary). Referencing a hash_key without a matching attribute block fails validation with "all attributes must be indexed."
billing_mode = "PAY_PER_REQUEST" — puts the table in on-demand mode. You pay per read/write request with no capacity to provision or manage, and DynamoDB auto-scales to traffic. Because of this mode, the read_capacity / write_capacity arguments are omitted — they're only valid (and required) under PROVISIONED billing. Setting them here would be a config error.

Why on-demand fits here

Beyond being the task requirement, PAY_PER_REQUEST is the simplest correct choice: no throughput math, no capacity planning, and it avoids the low provisioned-capacity caps that constrained sandbox environments impose on PROVISIONED tables. The table comes up ready to take reads and writes immediately.

Verify

aws dynamodb describe-table --table-name nautilus-users \
  --query 'Table.{Name:TableName,Billing:BillingModeSummary.BillingMode,Key:KeySchema,Attrs:AttributeDefinitions,Status:TableStatus}'

Expected — BillingMode: PAY_PER_REQUEST, a key schema with nautilus_id as HASH, an attribute definition of nautilus_id type S, and TableStatus: ACTIVE (the table takes a few seconds to transition from CREATING to ACTIVE).

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Assignment

Solution

DynamoDB Table — nautilus-users

main.tf