Hosting a Website Using AWS S3

NOTE: This post is still a work in progress.

This blog talks about how to setup a website using AWS S3 which might be intimidating for complete beginners. I also plan to create a tutorial/blog for complete beginners who want to setup their own website which I should link here in the future.

Overview

Hosting a website typically requires you to setup the following.

Web Server - where all your files uploaded and served through the network
Content Delivery Network (CDN) - where your static files are cached
Certificate - for SSL
Domain Name System (DNS) - where your domain name is registered

Component	What we’ll use
Web Server	S3
CDN	CloudFront
Certificate	ACM
DNS	GoDaddy

Step 1: Setup your S3 bucket

Create an S3 bucket in your AWS account and enable Static website hosting. Uncheck Block all public access and add a bucket policy. These settings will allow your files to be publicly accessed.

NOTE: Change Bucket-Name into your bucket name.

{
    "Version": "2012-10-17",
    "Statement": [
        {
            "Sid": "PublicReadGetObject",
            "Effect": "Allow",
            "Principal": "*",
            "Action": [
                "s3:GetObject"
            ],
            "Resource": [
                "arn:aws:s3:::Bucket-Name/*"
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Step 2: Setup CloudFront

Create a CloudFront distribution and use your S3 bucket as an origin.

Step 3: Request for ACM Certificate

Request for an ACM Certificate. It is recommended to use the DNS validation method.

Option 1: Add DNS CNAME record to verify the ACM Certificate

Add the CNAME entry and value to the list of DNS entries in your GoDaddy domain.

NOTE: It took less than 10 mins to get my domain verified.

Step 4: Add your custom certificate to CloudFront

After receiving your certificate, add your certificate to your CloudFront distribution.

Step 5: Setup GoDaddy to forward your domain

Add your CloudFront distribution domain name to your GoDaddy DNS record.

Don Figuerres