AWS Route 53 — Basics
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In this post, we will cover AWS Route 53 basics. We will also see how to use this service to register a domain. Later we will use this domain address to associate it with a S3 based static website.
Introduction
Route 53 is AWS’ very own core DNS offering.
Its is a highly available and scalable Domain Name System (DNS) web service.
While building Route 53, AWS main goal was to build a system that could survive beyond five nines of availability (99.999%) and it seems like AWS has achieved it.
You can use Route 53 to perform three main functions in any combination:
- Domain registration
- DNS routing
- Health checking
Along with standard DNS services, Route 53 also includes the ability to purchase and transfer domains to and from other registrars.
When you register a domain name using Route 53, it creates what’s called a public hosted zone (a public hosted zone is simply where DNS records for the domains are stored). You can create public hosted zone only for the domain, you own.
Private Hosted zones are not visible to public and they attached to AWS VPC. Multiple VPCs (even in different accounts) can be associated to a private hosted zone.
If you are getting started with a new domain, Route 53 is a good place to start.
But, before we go into Route 53 details, lets cover few DNS basics first.
What is a Domain
A domain is basically a human readable address for a specific network resource.
How do we get a domain?
Well, domains can be purchased just like any other store bought products. They are purchased from a domain registrar. So it just happens that AWS Route 53 is a domain registrar.
What is DNS
DNS, the domain name system, is the glue that holds the internet together.
DNS creates a mapping between an easy-to-remember name and a hard-to-remember IP Address. Also, you can think of DNS as a database:
