Lab: Provision cloud resources without an account (LocalStack)

What you will learn in this TP

• Provision in self-service
• Tell IaaS, PaaS and SaaS apart
• Understand metered service

A local cloud API #

What you will learn in this section

• Provision in self-service
• Tell IaaS, PaaS and SaaS apart
• Understand metered service

Context. To understand the Cloud nothing beats practice; but creating an account, entering a bank card and risking a bill is a barrier. LocalStack emulates AWS APIs locally: you run the same commands at no cost.

Prerequisites: Docker and AWS CLI  ·  Estimated time: 30 min

LocalStack emulates AWS services.

1. 1. Start LocalStack

   Why? Dummy credentials and a local endpoint reproduce AWS API usage exactly; only the entry point changes.

   Start LocalStack and set dummy credentials.

2. 2. Self-service object storage

   Why? Creating a bucket in one command illustrates on-demand self-service: no ticket, no waiting, the resource exists instantly.

   Create a bucket, upload a file and list it.

3. 3. Compute resource and message queue

   Why? Identifying who manages what (you or the provider) is the basis of the shared responsibility model, hence of security.

   Create an SQS queue and send/receive a message: which service models (IaaS, PaaS, SaaS) do these resources belong to?

4. 4. Clean up

   Why? Cleaning up is a vital reflex: in a real cloud a forgotten resource keeps being billed every day.

   Delete the resources: why does this matter in a real cloud?

Difficulty level : ●○○○○ (1/5)