Before we dive into the project, you'll need a few things:
AWS Account: You should have an active AWS account. If you don't have one, sign up for a free tier account here.
Amazon EC2 Instance: Launch an Amazon EC2 Linux instance. Make sure it has the necessary IAM (Identity and Access Management) role with S3 access permissions.
S3 Bucket: Create an S3 bucket in your AWS account if you haven't already. You'll mount this bucket to your EC2 instance.
SSH Access: Ensure you have SSH access to your EC2 instance. You'll need this to connect to your instance.
Step 1: Connect to Your EC2 Instance
Use SSH to connect to your Amazon EC2 instance. You'll need the public IP address or DNS name of your instance, as well as the private key associated with the instance. Replace <your-instance-ip> and <your-key.pem> with your actual information.
ssh -i <your-key.pem> ec2-user@<your-instance-ip>
Step 2: Update Your System
Before proceeding, it's always a good practice to update your system packages to the latest version:
sudo yum update -y
Step 3: Install S3FS
S3FS is not included in the default package repositories, so you'll need to add the EPEL (Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux) repository and then install S3FS:
sudo amazon-linux-extras install epel -y
sudo yum install s3fs-fuse -y
Step 4: Configure AWS Credentials
You'll need to configure AWS credentials to allow S3FS to access your S3 bucket. Create a file called .passwd-s3fs and store your AWS access key and secret key in it. Replace <your-access-key> and <your-secret-key> with your actual AWS credentials.
echo "<your-access-key>:<your-secret-key>" > ~/.passwd-s3fs
chmod 600 ~/.passwd-s3fs
Step 5: Mount the S3 Bucket
Create a directory where you want to mount your S3 bucket. In this example, we'll create a directory called /s3-mount.
sudo mkdir /s3-mount
Now, you can use S3FS to mount your S3 bucket. Replace <your-bucket-name> with the name of your S3 bucket:
sudo s3fs <your-bucket-name> /s3-mount -o passwd_file=~/.passwd-s3fs -o allow_other -o url=https://s3.amazonaws.com
Step 6: Verify the Mount
You should now be able to access your S3 bucket's contents through the mounted directory. For example, you can list the contents of your S3 bucket:
ls /s3-mount
Conclusion
You've successfully mounted an AWS S3 bucket on your Amazon EC2 Linux instance using S3FS! This powerful combination allows you to treat your S3 bucket like a local directory, simplifying data storage and retrieval. Whether you're using it for backups, data sharing, or as a part of your DevOps workflows, this setup can greatly enhance your AWS experience. Remember to secure your AWS credentials and configure proper IAM roles and permissions for security best practices.