AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional — Question 574

A company has several applications running in an on-premises data center. The data center runs a mix of Windows and Linux VMs managed by VMware vCenter.
A solutions architect needs to create a plan to migrate the applications to AWS. However, the solutions architect discovers that the document for the applications is not up to date and that there are no complete infrastructure diagrams. The company's developers lack time to discuss their applications and current usage with the solutions architect.
What should the solutions architect do to gather the required information?

Answer options

• A. Deploy the AWS Server Migration Service (AWS SMS) connector using the OVA image on the VMware cluster to collect configuration and utilization data from the VMs.
• B. Use the AWS Migration Portfolio Assessment (MPA) tool to connect to each of the VMs to collect the configuration and utilization data.
• C. Install the AWS Application Discovery Service on each of the VMs to collect the configuration and utilization data.
• D. Register the on-premises VMs with the AWS Migration Hub to collect configuration and utilization data.

Correct answer: C

Explanation

AWS Application Discovery Service is specifically designed to help plan migration projects by gathering configuration, usage, and behavior data from on-premises servers. Deploying the discovery agents directly on the VMs allows the architect to collect deep utilization data and map dependencies without needing input from the developers. Other services like AWS SMS are used for the actual migration process rather than discovery, and AWS Migration Hub acts as a central tracking portal rather than a direct data collector.