Automating Infrastructure Deployment – Challenge Lab (AWS Cloud Architecting)

This repository documents my work for the AWS Academy Cloud Architecting – Challenge Lab: Automating Infrastructure Deployment. The lab demonstrates how to transition from manual AWS configuration to a fully automated Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and CI/CD workflow using AWS-native tools.

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✅ Overview

The café team wants to scale their web presence across multiple AWS Regions and maintain consistent development and production environments. To achieve this, the deployment process is automated using:

• AWS CloudFormation
• AWS CodeCommit
• AWS CodePipeline
• AWS Command Line Interface (CLI)
• Amazon EC2 / S3 / VPC

This lab walks through building:

1. A static S3 website
2. A VPC (network layer) using IaC
3. A dynamic EC2-based café application
4. A full CI/CD workflow for automated stack deployment
5. Multi-Region duplication of both network and app stacks

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✅ Key Objectives

1. Build an S3 Static Website using CloudFormation

• Write a CloudFormation template from scratch
• Create an S3 bucket via AWS CLI
• Enable static website hosting
• Upload web assets programmatically
• Update the CloudFormation stack
• Add Outputs (website URL)

2. Store Templates in Git (CodeCommit)

• Clone a CodeCommit repository
• Push CloudFormation templates
• Track version history

3. Deploy VPC and EC2 App Using CodePipeline

Two AWS pipelines were used:

• CafeNetworkPipeline

Creates:

• VPC
• Public Subnet
• Routing resources
• Security group
• Exported Outputs (SubnetId, VPCId)

• CafeAppPipeline

Creates:

• EC2 instance with Apache, MariaDB & PHP
• Security group
• Automatically installs the dynamic café application
• Outputs the public IP of the web server

4. Duplicate the Entire Deployment to a Second Region

• Recreate the network stack via CLI (us-west-2)
• Create Region-specific EC2 key pairs
• Deploy the application stack using the same template
• Verify that the application runs in multiple Regions

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✅ Architecture

Network Layer

• 1× VPC
• 1× Public Subnet
• Internet Gateway
• Route Table + Route
• Security Group

Application Layer

• Amazon Linux 2 EC2 instance
• LAMP stack installed via UserData
• PHP app deployment via S3 script
• Public IP exposed for web access

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✅ CI/CD Workflow

1. Developer updates a CloudFormation template
2. Runs git add, git commit, git push
3. CodeCommit receives the commit
4. CodePipeline automatically triggers
5. CloudFormation deploys/updates the stack
6. EC2 launches + installs app automatically

This mirrors a real-world DevOps pipeline.

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✅ Commands Used

Create Stack

aws cloudformation create-stack --stack-name CreateBucket --template-body file://S3.yaml

Update Stack

aws cloudformation update-stack --stack-name CreateBucket --template-body file://S3.yaml

Validate Template

aws cloudformation validate-template --template-body file://S3.yaml

Git Workflow

git add .
git commit -m "update template"
git push

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✅ Multi-Region Deployment

Deploy network stack in Oregon:

aws cloudformation create-stack \
  --stack-name update-cafe-network \
  --template-body file:///home/ec2-user/environment/CFTemplatesRepo/templates/cafe-network.yaml \
  --region us-west-2

Upload app template to S3, then create stack via console using the S3 URL.

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✅ Skills Demonstrated

• Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
• CloudFormation template authoring
• VPC architecture
• CI/CD with CodeCommit & CodePipeline
• Linux UserData automation
• EC2 management
• S3 static hosting
• Cross-stack references (Outputs and ImportValue)
• Multi-Region architecture
• Git workflows
• AWS CLI automation

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✅ Conclusion

This challenge lab shows how CloudFormation and CI/CD fully transform deployment workflows. Using automation enables:

• Consistent deployments
• Faster environment provisioning
• Easier multi-Region scaling
• Better DevOps practices
• Stronger disaster recovery readiness

The final outcome is a fully automated, multi-Region café application deployed entirely through Infrastructure as Code.

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