[ci skip] automated comment issue creation and tag+archive page generation

Author: y8z

_posts/2024-03-16-aws_s3_notes.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title: Amazon AWS S3 setup
+subtitle:
+tags: [cloud, tutorial]
+author: Yuanpeng Zhang
+comments: true
+use_math: true
+---
+
+Introduction
+===
+
+Amazon S3 is a cloud service for setting up drives on the cloud, meaning that we can use it for
+storing and sharing files on the cloud. Compared to the Cloud drives that we commonly see and use
+every day, such as Dropbox, Google Drive, Proton Drive, Box, and among others to name, the Amazon
+S3 service is more like a backend thing for providing the underlying remote drive service. Based on
+such a backend engine, there exist wrapper apps to provide frontend interface for users to get
+access to the S3 cloud drive in an easy way.
+
+    > Though, AWS does provide frontend interface with which we can check, upload and download
+    files, it is for sure not for daily use as the access to the AWS S3 frontend interface is not
+    as straightforward as those daily used ones.
+
+Typically, one has two main types of options to use the S3 cloud drive. One main way is to mount
+the S3 drive locally using routines like `s3fs` and a few other options as mentioned in Ref. [1].
+Another typical way of using S3 drive is to use it as the storage service for some web drive apps.
+In my case, I have a VPS (transfer to [here](https://iris2020.net/2023-09-08-docker_nginx/) and [here](https://iris2020.net/2024-01-28-oracle_vps_vol_expand/) for more about my VPS set up with Oracle) on which I have web-based
+file servers `SFTPGo` [2], `FileCodeBox` [3] and `KOD Cloud` [4]. These web-based file servers
+provide the capability to use the S3 drive as the storage.
+
+In this tutorial, I will be covering the procedure to set up the AWS S3 bucket (the terminology that
+Amazon uses for their storage service). Also, I will put down some notes concerning the issues that
+I randomly came across when playing around with S3 service initially as a beginner.
+
+Setup
+===
+
+First, we can go to [https://aws.amazon.com/s3/](https://aws.amazon.com/s3/) where we can log in
+, if we have already got an account, or register one otherwise. The sign-in screen will look like
+this,
+
+<p align='center'>
+<img src="/assets/img/posts/s3_init.png"
+   style="border:none;"
+   width="300"
+   alt="s3_init"
+   title="s3_init" />
+</p>
+
+and the register screen will be like this,
+
+<p align='center'>
+<img src="/assets/img/posts/s3_register.png"
+   style="border:none;"
+   width="300"
+   alt="s3_register"
+   title="s3_register" />
+</p>
+
+Here, we can notice that in both the log-in and register screen, we have the definition of a `root`
+user. This is just like whatever other normal user account we created anywhere else -- the reason
+for calling this `root` user is because, later on, when logging into the AWS cloud service system,
+we will have the capability, as the `root` user, to create other users inside the AWS service (
+namely, the `IAM`, short for `Identity Access Management`). Amazon provides different entry point
+for these two different types of user account and that is why we see two options in the log-in
+screen.
+
+Once we have an account -- suppose we are talking about the `root` account here -- we can then log
+into the AWS control panel. After successful login, we will see screen like follows,
+
+<p align='center'>
+<img src="/assets/img/posts/s3_main.png"
+   style="border:none;"
+   width="300"
+   alt="s3_main"
+   title="s3_main" />
+</p>
+
+In the main control panel as shown, we can go to the search bar on the top-left to search for
+`S3` and we can then go to the `S3` control panel, where we can set up the so-called `bucket`.
+Basically, this is just the terminology used by AWS for `storage`. We can set up multiple buckets
+for different uses and they are independent from each other. As shown below, I have set up only
+one bucket,
+
+<p align='center'>
+<img src="/assets/img/posts/s3_bucket.png"
+   style="border:none;"
+   width="300"
+   alt="s3_bucket"
+   title="s3_bucket" />
+</p>
+
+The charging for the `S3` storage service is not like what we usually have for normal cloud drive
+services (the reason is also obvious -- as mentioned above, `S3` is more like a backend service) --
+it is based on the usage of the storage. Basically, we put files (`S3` calls them `objects`) in the
+`bucket` and `S3` will calculate the cost based on the size of the file and how long we have stored
+the file for, during the month. For sure, there are other factors in calculating the charge rate but
+still the basic idea stays. For more details, refer to Ref. [5].
+
+Tips & Notes
+===
+
+References
+===
+
+[1] [https://www.reddit.com/r/aws/comments/o7xffs/s3_bucket_mount_to_windows/?rdt=51783](https://www.reddit.com/r/aws/comments/o7xffs/s3_bucket_mount_to_windows/?rdt=51783)
+
+[2] [https://sftpgo.com/](https://sftpgo.com/)
+
+[3] [https://github.com/vastsa/FileCodeBox](https://github.com/vastsa/FileCodeBox)
+
+[4] [https://github.com/Handsomedoggy/KodExplorer](https://github.com/Handsomedoggy/KodExplorer)
+
+[5] [https://aws.amazon.com/s3/pricing/](https://aws.amazon.com/s3/pricing/)