Teradata Vantage on AWS FAQs

Choose from several methods for connecting to a Vantage on AWS system. Teradata recommends AWS Transit Gateway, which enables users to access their as-a-service account privately and securely. Customers may also use AWS PrivateLink, AWS Direct Connect and Virtual Private Network (VPN).

Yes. Please follow the steps you see when you click the "i" icon on the PrivateLink widget in the Console. The steps need to be performed in the AWS Account via the AWS console.

Yes. Included in the as-a-service subscription price is a 100Mbps site-to-site VPN configuration via publicly-routable IP addresses. This method can be used to connect the as-a-service system and a corporate network using a VPN in which an on-premises firewall/router is used to terminate the IPsec site-to-site tunnel connection, which encrypts all data.

Along with the 100Mbps site-to-site VPN, also included in the price is 1% (of system size) for data transfer out of the AWS region / VPC. Additional transfers incur additional costs (a pass-through of the AWS egress charges).

Whether or not a workload will need more bandwidth than 100Mbps depends on how much data is expected to be moving into or out of the as-a-service system. Follow this link for a simple calculator to help understand data transfer bandwidth needs better.

Please also note that while site-to-site VPN connections over the Internet are secure, actual bandwidth will vary. For guaranteed bandwidth, users will need to use a dedicated private circuit as described above.

A Teradata site-to-site VPN form must be submitted to Teradata Cloud Operations before a VPN tunnel can be established. This form is given to customers by the Teradata team upon order placement. Two global public IPs are required for routing return traffic on the site-to-site VPN.

Upon provisioning an as-a-service Vantage system, instructions will be provided on how to access the environment. Users receive a list of IP addresses to their database system(s), Viewpoint server, and utilities server along with instructions on how to access each one. The Viewpoint and utility servers will be preconfigured to access database system(s) from within the user’s Vantage system.

External IP addresses will be provided to access database systems directly from servers or desktops within an internal network, and download Teradata Tools & Utilities.

Database access to Teradata is available through any of the following drivers and utilities:

• ODBC, JDBC, OLE DB Drivers
• Net Data Provider
• Teradata CLIv2
• Teradata Plug-in for Eclipse
• BTEQ – command line query tool
• Teradata Studio – Eclipse-based database query tool

The Console is an easy-to-use web interface for monitoring and managing as-a-service systems. There is no additional charge for the Console and all as-a-service deployment types and regions are supported.

Console credentials will be sent to users via email once an as-a-service account is created. Upon receiving and changing credentials per the instructions in the email, users can log in to the Console using a Chrome web browser.

You can find information about the Console right in the Console itself. Just click the "i" icons.

Existing as-a-service customers can use their Teradata Support credentials to log in to the management web console via Chrome. New customers are provided with credentials once their systems have been set up and are ready to use.

Available features include:

• Resource summary and configurations
• Compute elasticity: Scale Up/Down and Out/In
• Cost optimization: Stop/Start
• Storage expansion
• Disk and CPU utilization
• Usage metering
• Availability reporting
• Event notifications
• IP info: CIDR, Vantage, Viewpoint
• Backup history and management
• Backup storage metering
• Support ticket management
• User management

Service owners and access managers are able to assign users to specific roles with limited access.

Yes, users may use both options to open/update/monitor support tickets. The Console provides a more filtered, simpler view of tickets; for detailed views, click on a ticket to open it in ServiceNow.

Customers can leverage existing Teradata Support channels or open a new request using the Support ticketing section of the Console.

Most system and database metrics are received and aggregated in 5-minute intervals.

The Backup section displays all registered backup jobs as well as the ability to edit the parameters of the backups. The most recent backup event logs are also available from this view. Backups can have weekly reports sent every Wednesday to the email assigned to the Technical Contact role registered in ServiceNow; submit a new service ticket to opt in to this weekly backup report.

Data loads are accomplished in the following ways:

• Teradata Parallel Transporter – (recommended)
  • Load Operator to insert data into empty tables (fastest)
  • Update Operator to insert/update data into populated tables
  • Stream Operator to insert data into tables concurrently (enhanced option)
  • Inserter Operator to insert BLOB data

• Legacy stand-alone tools – (for support of legacy scripts)
  • FastLoad
  • FastExport
  • MultiLoad
  • TPump (enhanced option)

Portable storage devices from AWS can be used to transfer large amounts of data into an as-a-service environment. Please review the Cloud Import/Export document available from the Cloud Service Desk for further details. Teradata Parallel Transporter can load data files in delimited or fixed width formats.

Yes, Teradata Vantage on AWS is a managed cloud service for analytics at scale. It provides secure, scalable, single-tenant environments in which Teradata provisions and maintains the Vantage system in Amazon Web Services so that customers can focus on answers, not IT. Consuming as-a-service enables users to get going quickly while scaling as they evolve.

As-a-service consumption of Vantage was designed from the ground up to deliver business benefits in four critical areas:

• Performance: Vantage is the most performant analytics software for always-on analytics in the cloud. No alternative comes close to its chart-topping throughput and response times.
• Security: Security is the number one priority for Teradata when it comes to the as-a-service environments provisioned and maintained for customers. Teradata invests in third-party audits to demonstrate compliance with the GDPR, PCI, HIPAA, ISO 27001, ad SOC 1 and 2.
• Availability: Teradata contractually guarantees the uptime of Vantage on AWS environments. A Service Level Agreement for 99.9% uptime translates into more productivity and higher satisfaction for business analysts and data scientists.
• Operations: Teradata handles infrastructure-level tasks—software patches, version upgrades, daily backups, performance reporting, and support ticket resolution—so customers can focus on managing the business.

Teradata Vantage on AWS features are comprehensive:

• Flexible capacity pricing model with monthly, 1-year, and 3-year options
• Subscription to world-famous Teradata Vantage software
• High-performance AWS infrastructure managed by Teradata
  • Secure, compliant environment audited for GDPR, PCI, HIPAA, ISO 27001, and SOC 1 and 2
• Service availability guarantee for 99.9% uptime
• Web console
• Comprehensive infrastructure services:
  • Onboarding assistance
  • Provisioning assistance
  • System monitoring
  • System maintenance
  • Patch management
  • Software upgrades
  • Encryption of data in motion and at rest
  • Daily backups administered by Teradata

For a complete explanation of what comes with Vantage on AWS, refer to the Cloud Service Description.

Customers use Teradata as-a-service offers for Vantage for all the same use cases as other Teradata deployment options:

• Production analytics
• Test and development
• Quality assurance
• Cloud data labs
• Disaster recovery

Go to the Customers section to read success stories and watch customer testimonials.

By default, Vantage on AWS is deployed in a Teradata-owned AWS account dedicated to the customer. Teradata provisions and manages the AWS compute and storage resources as part of the complete as-a-service solution. By exception, Vantage can be deployed as an AWS Managed Application in a customer-owned AWS account as described in this document.

Vantage on AWS is available from many AWS regions across the globe:

Australia

• Sydney (ap-southeast-2)

Bahrain

• Bahrain (me-south-1)

Canada

• Canada Central (ca-central-1)

France

• Paris (eu-west-3)

Germany

• Frankfurt (eu-central-1)

Hong Kong

• Hong Kong (ap-east-1)

Ireland

• Ireland (eu-west-1)

Japan

• Tokyo (ap-northeast-1)

Korea

• Seoul (ap-northeast-2)

Singapore

• Singapore (ap-southeast-1)

Sweden

• Stockholm (eu-north-1)

United Kingdom

• London (eu-west-2)

United States

• N. Virginia (us-east-1)
• Ohio (us-east-2)
• Oregon (us-west-2)

Vantage on AWS has Limited Availability from these Azure regions:

Brazil

• Sao Paulo (sa-east-1)

India

• Mumbai (ap-south-1)

Italy

• Milan (eu-south-1)

South Africa

• Cape Town (af-south-1)

United States

• N. California (us-west-1)

As-a-service delivery of Teradata Vantage offers the most performant and secure analytics platform in the cloud, enabling users to get going quickly and scale as they evolve. Because Teradata manages the environment and guarantees system availability, internal teams can save time, focus on delivering actionable insights, and get the most value from the organization’s investment. Plus, customers have the option to pay only for what they provision with flexible capacity pricing or pay only for what’s used with Consumption (pay-as-you-go) pricing.

When contemplating alternatives for enterprise analytics in the cloud, it’s easy to become distracted by bold claims about cloud benefits yet lose sight of the original business requirement: getting answers from data leading to better business outcomes. Teradata recommends selecting a portable solution that can support both current and future hybrid cloud needs and does not require internal teams to re-code, re-train, or re-orient the company’s entire analytic ecosystem.

The Cloud Operations team performs activities such as:

• Onboarding assistance
• Provisioning assistance
• System monitoring
• System maintenance
• Patch management
• Software upgrades

Cloud Operations continually monitors and administers the as-a-service environments to help ensure security, availability, backups, and data recovery.

No. Database Administrator services are typically the responsibility of the customer, but, customers are welcome to engage with Teradata Services to perform DBA and other value-add activities.

The Console is the web-based interface for monitoring and adjusting resource allocation for a system at the account level. Teradata Viewpoint is the primary operational view for monitoring and managing cloud systems. This instance of Viewpoint can only monitor as-a-service based systems.

The Console enables users to:

• View status of all as-a-service systems in one location
• Monitor and manage your as-a-service resources
• See database site metrics such as compute and storage utilization
• Open and monitor support tickets
• Add or delete user accounts

To learn more about the Console, consult the Console section in these FAQs.

Cloud Operations monitors platform availability, backups, and security of the as-a-service environment. 

Complete support for hardware and software is provided by the Teradata Cloud Operations team, which will inform customers when updates to Teradata software or operating systems are recommended. Cloud Operations will coordinate incidents and change control with users (for implementation of software updates) as required. Note: testing of software updates is the customer’s responsibility.

As-a-service system(s) will not be available when software maintenance is performed on systems during a planned maintenance window. Customers will receive ample notice prior to such planned maintenance taking place.

No. The Cloud Operations team does not have visibility or access to customer data or backups.

No. Customer data is never transferred across country borders.

Performance and storage limits for Vantage on AWS are as follows:

• Compute and I/O can scale from 3 TCore to nearly 1,000 TCore.
• Storage can grow from 10TB to over 4PB.

Fallback and compression are enabled by default for all user tables. Actual compression rates will vary depending on data demographics — however rates of 3X or higher are common.

• Compute and storage resources (EC2, EBS, S3) provisioned and managed by Teradata Cloud Operations
• Connectivity via AWS Transit Gateway, AWS PrivateLink, AWS Direct Connect, or VPN

All new as-a-service subscriptions support Teradata Vantage.

The minimum number of instances that can be specified in a single Vantage on AWS system is two.

Easy. As-a-service systems are elastic in that they can be scaled up and down (adjusting size of compute instances) and/or scaled out and in (adjusting number of compute instances) depending on resource availability. The Console is the web-based interface for monitoring and adjusting flexible system capacity.

Security is the number one priority when it comes to the as-a-service environments that Teradata provisions and maintains for customers. Teradata delivers across-the-board support for every facet of cloud security including physical security, network security, data protection, monitoring, and access controls.

The Teradata service architecture was designed to comply with – and is successfully audited annually for – strict international standards including:

• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)
• Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) 
• International Standards Organization (ISO) 27001
• Payment Card Industry (PCI)
• Service Organization Control (SOC) 1 and 2

The Information Security Management System gets annual third-party verification to ensure compliance with standards. These audit reports and the latest certifications are available upon request.

Yes. Teradata invests in rigorous third-party audits of our as-a-service offerings to demonstrate compliance with industry security regulations and industry best practices such as GDPR, PCI, HIPAA, ISO 27001, and SOC 1 and 2.

Please visit the Cloud Security page for more information. Read the press release on 3rd party audits for security and compliance.

As-a-service systems are LDAP ready. By default, systems will use a native database authentication method.

In Teradata Vantage, users DBC (superuser), SYSDBA (database management), and SECADM (security administration) are provided with TD2 authentication and default passwords. It is important for users to change passwords as soon as they can access the system. User SYSBACK is created on all Teradata systems and its password is secured by Cloud Operations. The SYSBACK user’s password should not be changed because it is used to execute daily backup operations on the system.

No. The Teradata Cloud Operations team does not have visibility or access to customer data.

No. Customer data is never transferred across country borders.

Teradata provides easy-to-follow documentation for understanding, getting started, and using Vantage on AWS on the following pages:

• Cloud Service Description
• Getting Started Guide
• Product Documentation:
• Teradata Vantage
• Teradata Data Lab
• Teradata Data Mover
• Teradata Data Stream Controller
• Teradata Ecosystem Manager
• Teradata QueryGrid
• Teradata Query Service
• Teradata Server Management
• Teradata Studio
• Teradata Tools and Utilities
• Teradata Viewpoint

Teradata provides Cloud Service Desk services 7 x 24 x 365 at 1-877-MY-TDATA (1-877-698-3282).

The Console and the Teradata Cloud Service Portal are also available 7 x 24 x 365 for the submission of incidents, changes, and requests for information.

Business Day: Monday-Friday 9:00 AM EST-8:00 PM EST.  

Next Business Day: Example: If a S2 or S3 incident is opened in the Teradata Cloud Service Portal after 8:00 PM EST on Friday, Teradata Staff will respond to this incident on Monday at 9:00 AM EST. 

Up to five (5) customer users will be provided with access to the Console and Teradata Cloud Service Portal for submitting requests for information and tracking incidents and changes.

TCore is a metric used to price Teradata software. TCores are “CPU cores potential based on I/O capacity”. The TCore metric provides a transparent, consistent measurement of a system configuration that takes the number of cores available and discounts that by the I/O available to keep the cores busy. This calculation is effective and applicable across all Teradata deployment options, thereby giving a compatible measurement to allow license portability from one platform to another.

TCore-Hours is a metric that represents the availability of TCores on the underlying infrastructure, by the hour. TCore-Hours are calculated by multiplying the TCore ratings of instances running Teradata software by the operating hours clocked by those instances. 

TCore-Hours offer the flexibility to consume TCores only when the underlying infrastructure running Teradata software is provisioned. Many workloads are characterized by a combination of steady-state consumption coupled with spikes (for both high demand as well as low utilization). TCore-Hours offers the flexibility to scale a system up, down, out, and in to match those workload needs – as well as the ability to stop the system when not needed – based on requirements over time, and then only pay for the corresponding provisioned resources.

Customers purchase TCore-Hours when first subscribing to an as-a-service contract for Vantage on AWS. Teradata recommends using the TCore-Hours Calculator to estimate the number of TCore-Hours needed for system usage. Additional TCore-Hours can be purchased at any time before the expiration of a user’s as-a-service contract at the same price.

First estimate the number of TCore-Hours needed for a system by using the TCore-Hours Calculator, then enter that value in the TCore-Hours field in the as-a-service listing. The minimum block size is 50,000 TCore-Hours. Upon subscribing to an as-a-service contract, the purchase will be complete, and that quantity of TCore-Hours will be added to the user’s TCore-Hours Block.

TCore-Hours are valid for one (1) year.

Baseline TCore-Hours are the starting point for estimating how many TCore-Hours will be needed for Baseline configuration. They represent the starting system configuration and how many TCore-Hours that will be needed if instances are on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year.

Once the as-a-service contract is created, TCore-Hours are added to the Block of TCore-Hours. Upon provisioning your system, TCore-Hours start getting consumed from the Block. Users can view and track Entitled, Used and Remaining TCore-Hours via the Console.

The Entitled TCore-Hours are drawn down from a user’s Block of TCore-Hours based on how they use their system. For steady-state consumption, a system utilizes TCore-Hours at a specific rate over time (per day/month/week/year). When performing elasticity operations such as Scale Up and Scale Out, TCore-Hours are drawn down from a Block at a faster rate because of the additional compute resources being utilized. When Scaling Down or Scaling In, the TCore-Hours consumption rate is decreased due to a smaller amount of compute resources being used. Stopping a system halts TCore-Hours consumption for the duration of when the system is Stopped.

Yes, users can add TCore-Hours to the as-a-service contract any time before the contract expires.

No. For more information, please see the End User License Agreement or contact the Teradata Account Team.

If a Block of TCore-Hours is drawn down to zero, Teradata will suspend the relevant system for 30 days, after which that site will be deleted. During the time that the system is suspended, users can reinstate it by ordering more TCore-Hours. After that 30-day period, customers will have to order a new as-a-service system and reload the data.