ACE-Specialist study plan
ACE-Specialist · Give each week a clear focus.
8 weeks · About 6 hours per week
Solution architecture and design
Translate a written business requirement into a component diagram with named services, data flows, and trust boundaries
Compare at least three architectural options for the same requirement and record the tradeoffs in a decision table
Identify single points of failure in a sample three-tier design and propose a resilient replacement for each
Distinguish tightly coupled from loosely coupled integration styles using concrete queue, event, and API examples
Your checkpoint
A two-page architecture decision record for one scenario containing a component diagram, three rejected alternatives with reasons, and a failure-mode table
Solution architecture and design & Deployment and implementation
Size compute, storage, and network capacity for a stated workload using a documented estimation method
Select a deployment topology that satisfies given latency, availability, and budget constraints
Map each design decision to the deployment task that will realize it
Explain how identity, networking, and data residency requirements propagate into design choices
Your checkpoint
A design-to-deployment traceability matrix listing every architectural component, the deployment step that creates it, and the constraint it satisfies
Deployment and implementation
Sequence a cloud deployment into ordered phases with explicit entry and exit criteria per phase
Contrast blue-green, canary, and rolling release strategies by rollback speed and blast radius
Define environment separation rules for development, staging, and production
Draft a cutover and rollback runbook for a stateful component migration
Your checkpoint
A deployment plan and rollback runbook covering four phases, each with entry criteria, verification steps, and a named rollback trigger
Deployment and implementation & Security, identity, and compliance
Apply least-privilege service identities to every component in a reference design
Specify encryption in transit and at rest for each data store and justify key management choices
Place network segmentation controls so that only intended traffic paths remain open
Verify a deployment plan against a compliance obligation and record the evidence produced
Your checkpoint
A security-annotated deployment checklist with one identity, one encryption decision, and one network rule per component, plus the evidence artifact each produces
Security, identity, and compliance
Design a federated identity flow that removes long-lived credentials from workloads
Classify data by sensitivity and assign retention, residency, and access rules per class
Map a regulatory requirement to the technical and procedural controls that satisfy it
Detect and remediate three common over-permission patterns in a sample policy set
Your checkpoint
A control-mapping table linking five stated compliance requirements to specific technical controls, the audit evidence each yields, and the owner
Operations, monitoring, and troubleshooting & Automation and infrastructure as code
Define service-level indicators and alert thresholds that page only on user-visible symptoms
Instrument a workload with logs, metrics, and traces and confirm one request can be followed end to end
Codify an existing manual environment build as a declarative template
Write a triage decision tree that separates configuration faults from capacity and dependency faults
Your checkpoint
A runnable declarative template that provisions one environment plus an observability spec with three SLIs, their thresholds, and their alert routing
Automation and infrastructure as code & Governance, cost, and lifecycle management
Build a pipeline that validates, plans, and applies infrastructure changes with a manual approval gate
Implement drift detection and describe the remediation workflow it triggers
Tag and label resources so cost can be attributed to an owner and an environment
Set a budget threshold with an alert and an automated response for a non-production account
Your checkpoint
A pipeline definition with plan, approval, and apply stages, plus a cost-attribution report grouped by owner tag and a configured budget alert
Governance, cost, and lifecycle management & Operations, monitoring, and troubleshooting
Apply a lifecycle policy that transitions and expires data per a stated retention rule
Audit a design against cost, reliability, and governance pillars and list prioritized remediations
Diagnose five seeded faults in a scenario and record the first diagnostic step for each
Rehearse the exam under timed conditions and classify every missed question by domain
Your checkpoint
A timed practice result summary with per-domain accuracy, five remediations ranked by risk, and a remediation schedule for the next 14 days
Milestones
Week 2: Produce a complete design for an unseen scenario in 45 minutes and score it against a self-written rubric covering availability, security, and cost, achieving at least 70 percent
Week 4: Explain the identity, encryption, and network path for any given component without notes, and pass a self-quiz on deployment strategies at 80 percent or higher
Week 6: Deploy one environment from a declarative template and demonstrate that a single request can be traced end to end through logs and traces
Week 8: Score at least 80 percent on a full timed practice set with no domain below 65 percent, and have a written remediation list for every gap