Introduction To AWS CloudFront
AWS Cloudfront is one of the leading content delivery network services or CDN. The CloudFront is a popular service to provide web content management and distribution service with scalable features. It processes and distributes both static and dynamic web content along with video and application files with low latency and high transfer rates. AWS Cloud front distributes the content that is sourced from Amazon S3 bucket store through regional centers known as edge locations.
The CloudFront service supports caching for faster web content delivery based on the content available on the CloudFront edge locations. There are several case studies available for implementing services specific to the media and entertainment industry. Some of the popular applications using AWS CloudFront are Amazon prime videos, Spotify, Hulu, and Sky News. It is also widely used for software distribution lifecycles.
How to Configure CloudFront to Deliver Content
A CloudFront distribution needs to be created which tells the CloudFront that from where your content would be delivered and other details like how to manage content delivery etc.
- Origin servers such as Amazon S3 bucket needs to be specified. CloudFront accesses your files from these servers then distributed globally through CloudFront edge locations.
- After specifying origin servers, upload your files on these origin servers. Files uploaded are called objects and they can be web pages, media files or others that can be served over HTTP.
- Then create a CloudFront distribution that would tell the CloudFront from which origin server it needs to access your files when they are requested by users.
- Then the CloudFront assigns a domain name to the newly created distribution of yours, which would be visible in CloudFront console.
- CloudFront sends the configuration of your distribution to all its edge locations where copies of your objects are cached by CloudFront.
How Content is Delivered to Users by CloudFront?
After configuring CloudFront, user’s requests are handled as follows:
- Any user can access your application or website and can request objects required like an HTML file or media file.
- When a request is sent by the user, Domain Name Server (DNS) sends or routes the request to the nearest CloudFront edge location or to an edge location that can best serve it.
- At the edge location, There can be two possibilities i.e. whether files requested are in cache or not. If files are in the cache then CloudFront returns them to the user and if files are not present in the cache then:
- CloudFront compares the specifications in your distribution with the request. Then forwards the request to the origin server of your distribution like Amazon S3 bucket for accessing the requested files.
- The origin server sends the requested files to the CloudFront edge location.
- When the first byte of the requested files arrives, CloudFront starts sending the files to the user.
- It also saves the files to the cache of CloudFront edge location so that it could be accessed easily in the future if the same or another user requests them.
Advantages of AWS CloudFront
- Fast and time-saving
- Can distribute data globally
- Highly secure content delivery network.
- Highly programmable
- Highly or deeply integrated with Amazon Web Services (AWS)
- Provides SSL optimizations and advanced capabilities like Field- Level Encryption, Session tickets, TLS Protocol Enforcements, etc.
- Provides Access control.
- Enables redundancy for origins
- Optimal performance due to network optimizations.
- Availability of a large number of tools such as CodeCommit, CodeDeploy, etc.
- Pay- as- you- go feature i.e. cost-effective
- Free transfer of data between Amazon CloudFront and AWS cloud services.
- Integrating network
- Geo-targeting
- Removes invalid files
AWS CloudFront Case Studies
- Hulu
- Amazon Prime Video
- Sky News
- M6
- Blue Billywig
- TVNZ
- Discovery Communications
- Spotify
- Bambuser
- Seven Networks
- Haystack TV
- Outkast
- NASA
- Spuul
- King Digital Entertainment PLC
- Supercell
- CCP Games
- Lockwood Publishing
- MovieStar Planet
- Instacart
- Amazon Fresh
- Vivino
- Digital Foodie
- TicketLeap
- Slack
- Nextdoor
- com
- Tozny
- my6sense
- Desire2Learn
- Canon
- Mapbox
- Dexecure
Use Cases of CloudFront
- Static Asset Caching
- Security
- Live and On-Demand Video Streaming
- Dynamic content
- API Acceleration
- Customizable content delivery using Lambda@Edge
- Software distribution
Scope
Amazon CloudFront is the fastest growing service in all Amazon Web Services. Its low latency and highest throughput made it popular among companies who need rapid transferring of their content. It provides security while transferring data making it reliable to use. It is one of the most innovative, progressive and innovative technology. It would help a lot in career growth.
Who is the Right Audience for Learning AWS CloudFront Technologies?
These technologies can be learned by anyone but it will be easy if you have prior knowledge about some topics like:
- Knowledge of Operating Systems
- Knowledge of virtualization
- Knowledge of networking
- Knowledge of software engineering tools
- Datacenter facilities
How this Technology will Help you in Career Growth?
This technology is fast growing and is very popular among renowned companies. There are multiple job opportunities across the globe in the field of AWS CloudFront. Salary of Software engineer ranges from $83,000 to $124,000 and the salary of Senior Software Developer ranges from $151,000 to $217,000.
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Conclusion
This article gives you a brief about what is AWS CloudFront. This is an innovative, dynamic and exciting area to pursue your career. Thousands of job opportunities are available across the globe for people interested.
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