Rapid Migration of an Ecommerce Portal Using AWS

This is the story of rapid deployment of an ecommerce store using Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Bitnami. Our Flux7 AWS Migration consultants installed Magento and hosted it on AWS.

But first, some background:

Undoubtedly, an ecommerce business directly depends upon its website’s uptime and ability to handle heavy traffic. It’s ability to manage random traffic spikes in special-case scenarios.

Ready-made online store platforms providing a web portal, logistics and easy-payment processing often solve the problems for the businesses willing to sell online.

However, for complex products sold online which require more options in product configuration and selectability, there’s a need of a comprehensive ecommerce solution, such as Magento.

And, that goes hand-in-hand with a promising host environment, can easily scale during the portal’s hour of need with either predictive-based services on running campaigns or in case of any sudden, overloading event.

AWS solves a lot of challenges using Magento in regard to scalability as an ecommerce website behaves spontaneously. You never know which one of your campaigns may go viral socially and everyone is behind your stock until the last piece is sold.

Why Use AWS

AWS is considered the leader in cloud-based services, because it has matured during the years in its web service offerings. It has a strong ecosystem of third-party vendors, tools and partners.

Put simply, Amazon is tough to beat for its cost, stability and robust tool set. With more than 35 major services and with more than 925 sub-services and features, AWS offers a wide range of benefits.

AWS offers traditional infrastructure services, including:

• Compute
• Storage
• Networking
• Reliability
• Security

Beyond that, it makes for a good modern ecosystem by providing:

• Dynamic scaling
• Memory storage
• Push-button deployments of the entire infrastructure
• Automated infrastructure management

The AWS ecosystem also has strong support for third-party tools that can be integrated to improve error detection, perform health checks, provide a degree of self-healing and disaster recovery, as well as support auto-scaling, which allows businesses to add capacity on demand — an important aspect for maintaining uptime.

With AWS, it’s possible to rent third-party tools on-demand. The mantra here is to rent, not buy. With just a few clicks, it’s possible to monitor your entire infrastructure for security breaches, error handling and health checks.

Ready, Set … Deploy Rapidly

Now, back to our tale of  rapid AWS migration.

Our ecommerce customer depended on requirements that kept it from using a hosted solution. So, we decided to deploy the store our customer needed using Magento. However, the customer needed the solution “yesterday.” So, we created an aggressive schedule, but one that could be achieved without needing a “Flux Capacitor.”

We used a Bitnami AMI for rapid deployment of the e-commerce store using AWS. Bitnami provides pre-configured images for a variety of tasks. Within a couple of hours, we went from creating an AWS account to setting up a server with Magento. The front-end team began deployment immediately.

As the front-end team worked on setting up the e-commerce site, the operations team modified the Magento instance to use Amazon RDS for automatic backups. In addition, transferring the state to RDS allowed us to set up auto scaling for high availability and scalability.

Amazon RDS helps to manage relational databases with ease. It provides online access to the capabilities of a familiar MySQL, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server or PostgreSQL relational database management system. But Amazon takes care of the more difficult operational parts to get your developers up and running. This includes essentials tasks, such as performing backups and setting up high availability.

With the migration off the instances into the DB, we were free to take advantage of cloud features, such as auto scaling. Auto scaling, with the help of Elastic Load Balancing (ELB), allows you to create a highly available and scalable setup. This ensures reliable service to end-users of the website.

You can learn more about accelerating your cloud migration, but for not only ecommerce, but any startup needing its existing cloud solution to scale, reduce costs, or meet compliance requirements. It’s also a solution for incubators helping startups establish their infrastructure to minimize risk and foster growth.

Find out more about our AWS Migration Services here:

Update: Flux7 has recieved official recognition as AWS migration consultants. Read about it here

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