AWS Projects, Labs, and Practice Challenges

Apply What You’ve Learned with Real-World AWS Use Cases and Mini Projects

Learning AWS is most effective when you build real applications and solve real problems. This chapter provides practical projects, lab scenarios, and challenges to reinforce your cloud architecture, automation, and security skills using AWS services.

Why Do Projects Matter?

Project 1: Static Website Hosting with S3 + Route 53

🎯 Goal:

Deploy a fully static website (HTML/CSS/JS) on Amazon S3, use Route 53 for domain routing, and enable HTTPS with CloudFront + ACM.

Services Used:

• Amazon S3
• Route 53
• AWS Certificate Manager
• Amazon CloudFront

Tasks:

1. Create S3 bucket and enable static website hosting.
2. Upload site content (index.html, styles.css).
3. Register or connect a domain via Route 53.
4. Create SSL certificate in ACM.
5. Deploy CloudFront distribution with HTTPS.
6. Test: https://yourdomain.com

Project 2: Scalable API with Lambda + API Gateway + DynamoDB

🎯 Goal:

Create a serverless backend to store and retrieve data using HTTP requests.

Services Used:

• AWS Lambda
• Amazon API Gateway
• DynamoDB
• IAM Roles
• CloudWatch

Tasks:

1. Create DynamoDB table (Users) with UserID as partition key.
2. Write Lambda function to handle POST/GET requests.
3. Connect Lambda to API Gateway.
4. Secure API with API key or IAM.
5. Log API requests using CloudWatch Logs.

Project 3: CI/CD Pipeline with CodePipeline + S3 + EC2

🎯 Goal:

Automate deployment of a web app to EC2 from GitHub using AWS-native tools.

Services Used:

• AWS CodePipeline
• AWS CodeBuild
• Amazon EC2
• GitHub
• S3 (for artifact storage)

Tasks:

1. Create EC2 instance and install web server.
2. Create CodePipeline with source = GitHub.
3. Use CodeBuild to zip files and deploy via SSH.
4. Monitor build logs and auto-deploy on commit.
5. Add notification via SNS on failure.

Project 4: VPC Design + Secure Web + DB Tier

🎯 Goal:

Build a production-grade network with public/private subnets, NAT gateway, web tier (EC2), and RDS in private subnet.

Services Used:

• Amazon VPC
• EC2
• RDS
• NAT Gateway
• Security Groups
• Route Tables

Tasks:

1. Create VPC with 4 subnets (2 public, 2 private).
2. Deploy NAT gateway in public subnet.
3. Launch EC2 in public subnet, install backend.
4. Launch RDS in private subnet.
5. Allow EC2 → RDS only via SG rules.
6. Disable public access to DB completely.

Project 5: Event-Driven Architecture (S3 → Lambda → SNS)

🎯 Goal:

When a new file is uploaded to S3, trigger a Lambda function that analyzes or validates the file and sends a summary via email.

Services Used:

• S3 (event source)
• Lambda (processor)
• SNS (notification)
• IAM (access roles)

Tasks:

1. Create S3 bucket.
2. Set up Lambda to log metadata (e.g., file size).
3. Create SNS topic and subscribe with email.
4. Integrate: S3 → Lambda → SNS.
5. Upload file → check email for notification.

🎯 Mini Challenge Set (Advanced Learners)

Tips for Success

🧰 Bonus Toolkits