🧪 Lab 1: Cloud Architecture Fundamentals (AWS)

Course: CompTIA Cloud+ CV0-004
Objective: Understand how to create and configure basic cloud infrastructure using AWS Free Tier.

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🎯 Goals

• Create a VPC and subnet
• Attach an Internet Gateway
• Launch a virtual machine (EC2)
• Connect to the instance via SSH

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📝 Part 1: Register for AWS Free Tier

Can use this as reference on how to signup: https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/amazon-web-services-aws-free-tier-account-set-up/

1. Go to https://aws.amazon.com/free
2. Click Create a Free Account
3. Follow the signup instructions:
4. Email and password
5. Billing info (credit/debit card)
6. Identity verification
7. Select the Free Basic Support Plan
8. Log in to https://console.aws.amazon.com

✅ Checkpoint: You should now be on the AWS Management Console.

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🌐 Part 2: Create a VPC with Public Subnet

1. Navigate to VPC service → "Your VPCs" → Create VPC
2. Name: cloudplus-vpc
3. IPv4 CIDR: 10.0.0.0/16

4. Leave rest as default → Create

5. Go to Subnets → Create Subnet

6. Name: public-subnet
7. VPC: cloudplus-vpc
8. AZ: e.g., us-east-1a

9. CIDR: 10.0.1.0/24

10. Go to Internet Gateways → Create:

11. Name: cloudplus-igw

12. Attach to: cloudplus-vpc

13. Edit Route Table:

14. Use default Route Table attached to VPC
15. Add route: 0.0.0.0/0 → cloudplus-igw
16. Associate with public-subnet

✅ Checkpoint: You have a VPC with internet access via a public subnet.

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🖥️ Part 3: Launch EC2 Instance

1. Go to EC2 Dashboard → Launch Instance
2. Name: cloudplus-ec2
3. AMI: Amazon Linux 2023
4. Type: t2.micro (Free Tier)
5. Key Pair: Create new → cloudplus-key → Download .pem
6. Network: cloudplus-vpc, Subnet: public-subnet
7. Auto-assign Public IP: Yes

8. Firewall: Allow SSH (port 22)

9. Launch Instance

✅ Checkpoint: Your instance is running with a public IP.

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🔌 Part 4: Connect to EC2

1. Open terminal and run:

chmod 400 cloudplus-key.pem
ssh -i "cloudplus-key.pem" ec2-user@<your-public-ip>

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🧹 Part 5 (Optional): Clean Up Resources

To avoid unnecessary charges from AWS, you should terminate any running resources after the lab.

✅ Terminate EC2 Instance

1. Go to the EC2 Dashboard
2. Select your instance (cloudplus-ec2)
3. Click Instance state → Terminate instance
4. Confirm the termination

✅ Checkpoint: Your instance should now show a status of "shutting down" and will soon be removed.

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✅ Lab Complete

You’ve successfully:

• Set up your first cloud infrastructure
• Created and configured a VPC, subnet, and internet gateway
• Launched and connected to a cloud-hosted virtual machine (EC2)
• Practiced fundamental cloud networking and security setup
• (Optionally) Cleaned up cloud resources to avoid unnecessary charges

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🧠 Knowledge Check (Optional)

Before moving on, ask yourself:

• Can I explain the purpose of a VPC and subnet?
• Do I understand what an internet gateway does?
• Can I SSH into an EC2 instance securely?
• Do I know how to terminate resources I no longer need?

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📎 Additional Resources

• AWS Free Tier Documentation
• Amazon EC2 Documentation
• VPC Networking Guide

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📌 Recommended Next Steps

• Proceed to Lab 2: Cloud Deployment Strategies (Blue/Green)
• Explore more about IAM roles and security groups
• Try launching a RHEL instance instead of Amazon Linux

Happy Cloud Learning! ☁️🚀