How to Launch Your Virtual Machine (VM) on AWS

Before moving on with this, here is a good tutorial by AWS with step-by-step guide that will help you successfully launch a Linux virtual machine on Amazon EC2 within their Free Usage Tier.

1. Sign In to AWS:
   • Open the AWS website and log in to your account. (If you don’t have one, you can create a free account).
2. Find EC2 Service:
   • After logging in, go to the EC2 Dashboard. EC2 is the part of AWS where you manage virtual machines.
3. Launch a New EC2 Instance:
   • Click on “Launch Instance”. This starts the process of creating your virtual machine.
   • Give your instance a name (e.g., “MyFirstVM”).
4. Choose Your Operating System:
   • You need to choose an operating system for your virtual machine. You can select:
     • Ubuntu or Amazon Linux 2 for Linux-based systems.
     • Windows Server if you want a Windows VM.
5. Pick the Right Instance Type:
   • For beginners, choose t2.micro or t3.micro as they are free to use with the AWS free tier.
6. Configure Your Instance:
   • Use the default settings for now (or you can change them if you know what you’re doing).
   • Make sure the “Auto-assign Public IP” option is turned on. This allows you to access your VM from the internet.
7. Add Storage:
   • You’ll be given 8 GB of storage by default, which is enough for basic tasks. You can increase the size if needed.
8. Set Up Security Group:
   • A Security Group is like a firewall. You need to set rules for what can connect to your VM.
   • For basic access, enable:
     • SSH (for Linux) on port 22.
     • RDP (for Windows) on port 3389.
9. Review and Launch:
   • Check everything one last time and click “Launch”.
   • You’ll be asked to create a key pair (a secure login file). Download this file and keep it safe.

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Configuring Your Virtual Machine After Launch

Once your VM is running, follow these steps to set it up:

1. Connect to Your VM:

• For Linux: Use SSH to connect from your terminal:

  ssh -i "your-key.pem" ec2-user@your-public-ip
  

• For Windows: Use RDP (Remote Desktop) to connect.

2. Update the Operating System:

• For Linux (Ubuntu or Amazon Linux):

  sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y  # For Ubuntu
  sudo yum update -y  # For Amazon Linux
  

• For Windows, go to Settings and update the system.

3. Install Important Tools:

• For Linux:

  sudo apt install -y git curl wget  # Ubuntu
  sudo yum install -y git curl wget  # Amazon Linux
  

• For Windows, download programs like Google Chrome or Visual Studio Code.

4. Add New Users and Set Permissions (Optional):

• You can create new users and give them specific permissions, like admin access:

  sudo adduser newuser
  sudo usermod -aG sudo newuser
  

5. Set Firewall Rules (Optional):

• You can change the security group settings to allow specific services like HTTP (for websites) or HTTPS (for secure websites).

6. Test Your Connection:

• Try pinging the VM or connect using SSH/RDP to ensure everything is working.

7. Install Optional Software:

• If you want to set up a web server (like Apache), run:

  sudo apt install apache2 -y  # Ubuntu
  sudo yum install httpd -y  # Amazon Linux
  

• You can also install MySQL or other software as needed.

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This experiment helps you learn the basics of using cloud virtual machines, which is important for more advanced cloud computing tasks.