AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional (SAP-C02) — Question 26

A software company has deployed an application that consumes a REST API by using Amazon API Gateway, AWS Lambda functions, and an Amazon DynamoDB table. The application is showing an increase in the number of errors during PUT requests. Most of the PUT calls come from a small number of clients that are authenticated with specific API keys.
A solutions architect has identified that a large number of the PUT requests originate from one client. The API is noncritical, and clients can tolerate retries of unsuccessful calls. However, the errors are displayed to customers and are causing damage to the API’s reputation.
What should the solutions architect recommend to improve the customer experience?

Answer options

• A. Implement retry logic with exponential backoff and irregular variation in the client application. Ensure that the errors are caught and handled with descriptive error messages.
• B. Implement API throttling through a usage plan at the API Gateway level. Ensure that the client application handles code 429 replies without error.
• C. Turn on API caching to enhance responsiveness for the production stage. Run 10-minute load tests. Verify that the cache capacity is appropriate for the workload.
• D. Implement reserved concurrency at the Lambda function level to provide the resources that are needed during sudden increases in traffic.

Correct answer: B

Explanation

Option B is correct as it addresses the issue of excessive requests from a single client by limiting their API usage, thus preventing errors and protecting the API's reputation. Option A, while helpful for error handling, does not prevent the root cause of excessive requests. Option C focuses on caching, which may not resolve the error issues related to PUT requests. Option D pertains to resource management but doesn't directly mitigate the problem of request overload from the client.