Launch your static website using AWS S3 and AWS CloudFront

AWS S3 and AWS CloudFront are two powerful AWS services that can be used to launch a static website. S3 is a highly scalable object storage service that can store any type of data, including HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and images. CloudFront is a content delivery network (CDN) that can deliver your website content to users around the world with low latency and high availability.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, you should have the following prerequisites in place:

• An AWS account.
• A static website (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and other static assets).
• Domain name (optional, but recommended).
  
  

Steps to Launch Your Static Website

Create an S3 Bucket

Amazon S3 is an object storage service that’s perfect for hosting static websites. Here’s how to set up an S3 bucket:

• Log in to your AWS Management Console.
• Navigate to the S3 service.
• Click the “Create Bucket” button.
• Choose a unique name for your bucket, and select the AWS region closest to your target audience.
• Leave the other settings as default and click “Create.”
  
  

Configure Your S3 Bucket for Website Hosting

Once you’ve created your S3 bucket, you need to configure it to host your website:

• Select the newly created bucket.
• Go to the “Properties” tab.
• Click on “Static website hosting.”
• Choose “Use this bucket to host a website.”
• In the “Index document,” enter the name of your website’s main HTML file (e.g., “index.html”).
• Optionally, add an error document if you have a custom error page.
• Click “Save.”
  
  

Upload Your Website Files

To make your static website available, you need to upload your website files to the S3 bucket:

• In the S3 bucket, go to the “Overview” tab.
• Click “Upload” and select your website files.
• Click “Next” until you’ve uploaded all the files.
• Make sure the files are set to “public” by checking the “ACL” settings for each file.
  
  

Enable Public Access

For your website to be accessible to the public, you need to set the permissions correctly:

• In the S3 bucket, go to the “Permissions” tab.
• Under “Block public access,” click “Edit.”
• Disable all the settings that block public access.
• Save the changes.
  
  

To upload your website content using the AWS CLI, run the following command:

aws s3 cp path/to/your/website-content s3://your-bucket-name

Test Your Website

Your website is now hosted on S3. You can test it by clicking on the endpoint URL provided on the “Static website hosting” tab. If everything is set up correctly, your website should be accessible via this URL.

(Optional) Configure a Custom Domain

To use a custom domain (e.g., www.identicalcloud.com), follow these steps:

• Go to AWS Route 53 or your domain registrar.
• Create a new DNS record pointing to the S3 bucket URL. This is done by creating a CNAME record and setting the S3 bucket as the alias target.
• It may take some time for the DNS changes to propagate.
  
  

Set Up AWS CloudFront for CDN

While hosting your website on S3 is cost-effective and straightforward, adding AWS CloudFront as a CDN provides faster content delivery. Here’s how to set it up:

• Go to AWS CloudFront.
• Click “Create Distribution.”
• Choose “Web” and configure the settings accordingly.
• For the “Origin Domain Name,” select your S3 bucket.
• Leave the other settings as default or customize as needed.
• Create the distribution.
  
  

Update Your DNS Settings

To take advantage of CloudFront, update your DNS settings to point to the CloudFront distribution URL. This ensures that your content is delivered via the CDN.

Test Your Website with CloudFront

Once the DNS changes have propagated, your website is now served through CloudFront. Test your website to ensure it’s working as expected.

By following the steps above, you can launch a static website using AWS S3 and AWS CloudFront. AWS S3 and AWS CloudFront are two powerful AWS services that can be used to create a highly scalable and available static website.