- You can read Part 2 here.
Amazon Web Services (AWS), is often used to run custom-built applications in the cloud. Developers will need to create Elastic Compute Cloud instances (EC2) (a.k.a. developers will need to create Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances (a.k.a. virtual machines) and log in to them to configure the required app. Sometimes, however, it may not be sufficient to interact directly with an EC2 instance. Sometimes, you may need to access an Amazon Simple Storage Service bucket without having to interact with an EC2 instance. This article will demonstrate how to use Microsoft Visual Studio to accomplish this. This column assumes that you already have an S3 account and that you can access it through Visual Studio. First, download the AWS Toolkit Visual Studio. You can find the current version here. This version is only compatible with Visual Studio versions older than 2012. Visual Studio 2012 and earlier versions will not work with this version. You will need to download the legacy version from the download link. The installation of the AWS Toolkit is fairly straightforward. There is one thing you need to be aware of during the installation process. There are many sub-components to the AWS Toolkit. AWS Toolkit For Visual Studio is one of these components. It contains all the tools necessary to gain access to S3. Although it is not always consistent, I have noticed that sometimes this component is not installed by default. As shown in Figure 1. Before you complete the Setup Wizard, make sure that this component is enabled. Figure 1: To install the AWS Toolkit to Visual Studio, you will need to follow these steps. Next, create an IAM account so Visual Studio can access AWS. Log in to AWS console to create the account. Next, go to the home screen to see the list of services. Next, find the Security, Identity and Compliance section and click the IAM link. This will take to the console’s Identity and Access Management screen. Click on the Users container located in the console tree at the left of the screen. Next, click on the Add User button as shown in Figure 2. [Click image to enlarge] Figure 2: Click the Add User button. The Add User screen will now appear. This screen will require you to give a name to the user account you are creating, and to specify the access the user will need. This account will require programmatic access at a minimum. Figure 3. [Click on the image to see a larger version.] Figure 3: A programmatic access will be required to AWS for the account. You will be taken to Permissions screen when you click the Next button. You can add the user to a group by default. If you have previously created an administrative group, you can use it. Another option is to click the Attach Existing Policy Directly icon and then select AdministratorAccess policy. [Click on the image to see a larger version.] Figure 4: Administrator rights will be granted to the user account. Click Next to be taken to a screen where you can review your user account settings. If everything looks fine, click the Create User button to create your account. After the account has been created, you will be redirected to a screen which displays the Access Key ID as well as the Secret Access Key. These keys are very important to keep track of. AWS will not give them again. You will need the keys to link Visual Studio with AWS. I have had to document AWS.