11 months ago (Back in May 2018) I read a post on Reddit by u/SpectralCoding (reddit.com) called So, you want to learn AWS? AKA, “How do I learn to be a Cloud Engineer?” (reddit.com) about what steps one could take to learn to be a AWS Cloud Systems Engineer. SpectralCoding was hiring for AWS Cloud Engineers and was frustrated with the lack of real world knowledge of AWS. In the style of “How to Linux Admin” SpectralCoding posted a guide on what they consider to be essential knowledge in this space.
I keep going back to this post every few months and finally I’ve bitten the bullet and decided to dive into it. And wow. Its a pain in the ass. The AWS documentation is plentiful and informative if you know how to read it, but woefully inadequate in certain places and at times I wanted to tear my hair out. There are plenty of tutorials for certain things, but nothing that brings it all together into one resource.
This series of posts will include all the steps, screenshots and scripts needed to do this. This series is intended for people wanting to learn but are having a lot of difficulty in understanding whats going on. Its taken me a long time to go through and document each step, but in doing so has given me a deeper understanding of what is required.
Its my hope that you first try it yourself, then read this for the tricky parts or for when you get stuck. I will try my best to explain why I am doing something and not just what I am doing.
Everything written will be related to AWS as I am using it in Mid 2019. As mentioned in the original thread, If you follow everything you will have to pay for certain services. The total cost should be around $50 USD if you turn off your stuff when not in use.