Containerize a Legacy Java Monolith and Move It to AWS ECS
Overview
What this challenge is about.
Containerize a Java monolith with Docker, deploy it to AWS ECS using Terraform, and compare performance to a datacenter baseline. Earn a verifiable certificate.
The scenario
The carrier writes motor and home policies across Ireland and sells through brokers and a direct website, so its quoting engine handles bursty daytime load and must stay available during business hours. The datacenter lease is being wound down, which is why the 2026 roadmap depends on proving a safe, cost-neutral lift of this monolith to the cloud.
The Brief
What you'll do, and what you'll demonstrate.
Package a legacy Java 8 monolith into containers, run it on AWS ECS Fargate, and prove its speed, reliability, and cost match the existing datacenter servers.
Earning criteria — what you'll demonstrate
- Containerize a legacy Java application with a multi-stage build that produces a lean, reproducible runtime image.
- Express a complete ECS Fargate environment (load balancer, managed database, managed cache) as idiomatic, reusable Terraform.
- Design and run an honest traffic-replay benchmark and present latency, error-rate, and cost comparisons defensibly.
- Write operational documentation precise enough for another team to execute a migration and a rollback unaided.
Program Fit
Where this fits in your program.
Sharpens the same skills your degree expects you to demonstrate.
Aligned coursework coming soon.
Skills
Skills you'll demonstrate.
Each one shows up on your verified credential.
- Containerization
Apply containerization to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Docker
Containerize applications for consistent development, testing, and deployment.
- Aws
Deploy and manage infrastructure and services on Amazon Web Services.
- Terraform
Apply terraform to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Java
Apply java to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Documentation
Apply documentation to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
Careers
Career paths this challenge builds toward
Completing this challenge demonstrates skills that transfer directly to these roles:
Cloud Migration Engineer
Lifting a legacy Java monolith onto managed cloud services while proving cost-and-latency parity is the core of cloud migration work, and this challenge has you do exactly that end to end — from container image to provisioned infrastructure to a defensible benchmark.
This challenge sharpens
- containerization
- aws
- terraform
Platform / DevOps Engineer
Platform engineers ship reproducible infrastructure and operational runbooks other teams rely on. Here you produce idiomatic Terraform, a clean container build, and a migration runbook precise enough for another team to execute, mirroring the day-to-day of the role.
This challenge sharpens
- docker
- terraform
- documentation
Java Application Modernization Engineer
Modernization specialists repackage aging Java systems for the cloud without breaking behavior. This challenge centers on a Java 8 / Tomcat application, requiring you to containerize it faithfully and prove the cloud version behaves like the original.
This challenge sharpens
- java
- containerization
- documentation