Getting Started with AWS: A Beginner’s Blueprint for Cloud Success

2.3 Hands-On Quickstart Project: Hosting a Static Website on S3

A practical first project is hosting a static site on Amazon S3. This uses the aws setup command line beginners path and ties together S3 and IAM fundamentals.

1. Install & Configure AWS CLI (Command Line Interface)

   • Follow official docs to install AWS CLI:

     bash

     # On macOS / Linux:
$ curl "https://awscli.amazonaws.com/awscli-exe-linux-x86_64.zip" -o "awscliv2.zip"
$ unzip awscliv2.zip
$ sudo ./aws/install

      

     # On Windows: Download MSI installer from AWS website


   • Run aws configure and input your Access Key ID, Secret Access Key, Default Region (e.g., us-east-1), and Default Output Format (e.g., json).

2. Create an S3 Bucket

   bash

   $ aws s3 mb s3://my-beginner-site-12345 --region us-east-1


   • Ensure the bucket name is globally unique.

3. Enable Static Website Hosting

   bash

   $ aws s3 website s3://my-beginner-site-12345 --index-document index.html --error-document error.html


4. Upload Website Files

   • Create a simple index.html and error.html locally.

   • Upload to S3:

     bash

     $ aws s3 cp index.html s3://my-beginner-site-12345
$ aws s3 cp error.html s3://my-beginner-site-12345


5. Set Bucket Policy for Public Read Access

   json

   {
"Version":"2012-10-17",
"Statement":[{
"Sid":"PublicReadGetObject",
"Effect":"Allow",
"Principal":"*",
"Action":["s3:GetObject"],
"Resource":["arn:aws:s3:::my-beginner-site-12345/*"]
}]
}


   • Apply policy via CLI or console:

     bash

     $ aws s3api put-bucket-policy --bucket my-beginner-site-12345 --policy file://policy.json


6. Access Your Website

   • In the console, navigate to Buckets → my-beginner-site-12345 → Properties → Static website hosting. Copy the Endpoint URL (e.g., http://my-beginner-site-12345.s3-website-us-east-1.amazonaws.com).

   • Open it in a browser; you should see your index.html content live.