A website made using Next.js and AWS for the distribution of my book, The AWS Flash Guide. The website sends a copy of the book to the user via email, provides a readily available sample of the book for direct download, and keeps track of the number of people who have visited the site.
Website link: flashguide.info
A concise, quick, no-nonsense guide to AWS. Useful for both veterans with years of experience and beginners just starting their AWS journey. Provides the reader with:
- Concise Summaries: Key AWS services and concepts are broken down into manageable sections, allowing for quick review and comprehension.
- Flashcard-Like Format: A compilation of 100+ topics presented in an easy-to-digest format, from the basics of Cloud Computing to niche AWS services.
- Visual Aids: Carefully selected infographics and diagrams from public sources enhance your understanding and retention of information.
(Also available on Amazon Kindle)
When the user accesses the website URL, either directly or through a link, Route 53 performs DNS resolution, directing the request to the nearest CloudFront edge location.
CloudFront then, in turn, serves the website from the linked S3 bucket, where the Next.js application is hosted.
The Next.js application includes connections to AWS Lambda functions both through direct function URLs and through an API Gateway fir the implementation of the necessary dynamic functionality, namely: sending emails and fetching/updating the website's view count.
- User Interaction: The user enters their email into a textbox and clicks the send button.
- Request to Lambda: An HTTP request containing the email value is sent to the Lambda Function URL.
- Email Sending: The Lambda function, using the Nodemailer module, sends the PDF to the provided email address while a loading pop-up window is displayed to the user.
- Feedback to User: If the email was successfully sent, the loading pop-up window transitions to a success window. Otherwise, if there is an error, it shows an error window instead.
Website View Count Management:
- API call on Initialization: Upon landing on the page, a REST API request is sent to AWS Lambda through an API Gateway.
- Update and Return: The Lambda function fetches the current visitor count from DynamoDB as a local variable, increments it and both returns the updated value and updates the corresponding value in DynamoDB.
Some of the Cloud infrastructure, like the S3 bucket itself, its assosciated CloudFront distribution was originally created and partially configured using a Terraform script.
A CI/CD pipeline was then created for the population of the S3 bucket using GitHub Actions. A seperate "Production" GitHub repository with the Next.js files was then created. Then, the uploading of Next.js files into the S3 bucket is done with AWS CLI commands specified in a YAML file executed by GitHub Actions. This forms the crux of the CI/CD pipeline for the website, updating the S3 bucket whenever changes from the development repository are transferred over to the production repository.
(This was done manually in my case, though automation for the same can be done using a simple bash/powershell script.)