Amazon DynamoDB, the NoSQL database service of AWS now supports online indexing. Along with this, customers can now buy reserved capacity for long term usage.
In December 2013, AWS added Global Secondary Indexes capability to DynamoDB. This feature made it possible for developers to create additional indexes and query the tables using attributes other than the primary key. DynamoDB supports up to five Global Secondary Indexes that can be defined during the creation of a table, each referencing either a hash key or a hash key and a range key. Online indexing feature enables the creation and deletion of Global Secondary Indexes on the fly. This functionality is exposed through DynamoDB’s UpdateTable API. There are no additional charges for using this feature and customers will need to pay for the storage of Global Secondary Indexes created.
When customers buy Amazon DynamoDB, they provision capacity based on the expected read and write operations. The provisioning model allows them to add capacity in anticipation of high traffic and to remove it when it is not needed. In scenarios where the usage of DynamoDB is expected for a longer period, customers can purchase Reserved Capacity for a one year or a three year term. They will pay an upfront fee for reserving the capacity along with the monthly fee that is charged based on the amount of capacity purchased. Through this model, customers will be able to save up to 53% for one year term and 76% for the three year term on the regular hourly rates of DynamoDB. Through the integration with AWS Management Console, Reserved Capacity can be bought during the creation of the table. The minimum requirement for purchasing Reserved Capacity is 100 read and write operations.
As part of the AWS Free Tier, DynamoDB customers get 25 writes/second, 25 reads/second, and 25GB of storage for free.