AWS EC2 Instance Creation Guide

Based on AWS Cloud Quest Learning Experience

Prerequisites

AWS Management Console access
Basic understanding of cloud computing
Selected AWS Region (Cloud Quest typically uses us-east-1)

Step-by-Step Instance Creation Process

1. Access EC2 Dashboard

Log into AWS Management Console
Navigate to EC2 service
Click "Launch Instance" button

2. Choose Amazon Machine Image (AMI)

The AMI provides the information required for launching an instance.

Select Amazon Linux 2 AMI
This is a free-tier eligible option
Comes with common tools pre-installed

3. Choose Instance Type

The Instance Type specifies the hardware of the host computer used for this instance. The instance types are grouped based on their compute, memory and storage capabilities.

Select t2.micro for free tier
Specifications:
- 1 vCPU
- 1 GB RAM
- Variable ECU (Elastic Compute Units)
Key pair: Proceed without a keypair name (not recommended for irl scenarios, only suitable for lab environment) Amazon EC2 uses public key cryptography to encrypt and decrypt login information. Public key cryprography uses a public key to encrypt a piece of data and the recipient uses the private key to decrypt the data. The public and private keys are known as key pair.

4. Configure Instance Network Details

Network: Lab VPC A Virtual Private Cloud resides in an AWS Region, but the Subnet resides within a single AZ (Availability Zone)
Subnet: Choose the one which represents your desired Availability Zone! For this example, we need to choose Subnet 1 for the AZ us-east-1a
Auto-assign Public IP: Enable
Keep other settings as default

5. Configure a virtual Firewall

The Firewall settings on AWS are known as Security Groups. The Security Groups control the traffic for one or more instances. Rules can be added to a security group for it to allow traffic from its associated instances.

Name the security group
Specify its characteristics in the description
Choose security group type (for this lab example, HTTP must be used)

6. Add Storage

Default: 8 GB root volume
Volume type: GP2 (General Purpose SSD)
Delete on termination: Yes

7. Advanced Details

Upload the user data file provided by the quest.

8. Review and Launch

Review all configurations
Click "Launch"
Launch instance

8. Monitor Instance Status

Wait for instance state: "Running"
Check status checks: "2/2 checks passed"
Note the public IP address

9. Connect to Instance

# Example SSH command

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

Best Practices Learned

Always use security groups to control traffic
Keep your key pair file secure
Use tags to identify resources
Monitor instance metrics
Stop or terminate instances when not needed

Common Troubleshooting

Cannot connect to instance:
- Check security group rules
- Verify key pair permissions
- Confirm instance is running
Instance launch fails:
- Check service limits
- Verify AMI availability
- Review error messages

Cost Considerations

Free tier includes:
- 750 hours per month of t2.micro
- 30 GB of storage
- 1 GB of snapshots
Monitor usage to avoid charges
Stop instances when not in use

Key Commands Learned

# Check instance status

aws ec2 describe-instances



# Stop instance

aws ec2 stop-instances --instance-ids i-1234567890abcdef0



# Start instance

aws ec2 start-instances --instance-ids i-1234567890abcdef0



# Terminate instance

aws ec2 terminate-instances --instance-ids i-1234567890abcdef0

Security Tips

Use principle of least privilege
Regularly update security groups
Use strong key pairs
Enable CloudTrail for auditing
Monitor AWS Trusted Advisor recommendations

Next Steps

Learn about Auto Scaling
Explore Elastic Load Balancing
Study AWS networking concepts
Practice with different instance types
Learn about AWS CLI commands

Resources

AWS Documentation
Cloud Quest game scenarios
AWS Well-Architected Framework
AWS Free Tier details

Notes

This guide is based on the AWS Cloud Quest learning experience and represents a simplified version of AWS instance creation. In production environments, additional security and configuration considerations may be necessary.

License

Tech-Freedom/aws-instance

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