Night 30 — Lab 4A: S3 lifecycle + cost (storage classes, Cost Explorer, Budgets)

~2 hr. $0–$1 AWS spend — lifecycle rules are configuration-only (no immediate transition charges). Cost Explorer and Budgets are read/alert tools. Optional -CreateBudget sends a confirmation email — $0 until you confirm. Applies the Night 29 storage tree to globalskiatlas-backend-k8s-output.

Plain language first

What is S3 lifecycle?

S3 lifecycle is a bucket-level automation that moves or deletes objects based on age, prefix, or tags — so you do not manually change storage class every month.

Analogy (GSA Iceland): Each monthly pipeline run lands in iceland/2026-06/, iceland/2026-07/, … Lifecycle is the warehouse manager who slides last year’s boxes to cheaper shelves (Standard-IA, then Glacier) while this month’s box stays on the fast pick floor (Standard).

S3 storage class ladder (exam refresher)

Night 29 tree leaf: lifecycle automates moves along this ladder — it does not replace picking the right class at upload.

Lifecycle vs replication vs versioning

Exam trap: Expiring the only copy in one bucket is not DR — pair expiration with replication or AWS Backup (Night 19).

Cost Explorer vs Budgets vs CUR

Tonight’s lab runs Cost Explorer (get-cost-and-usage) and optionally creates a monthly cost budget with an email alert.

Block 1 (~30 min) — Storage classes + GSA prefix map

Read gsa-s3-lifecycle-map.md

globalskiatlas-backend-k8s-output
  iceland/2026-06/   ← Night 10 durable output (Standard today)
  iceland/2026-07/   ← next monthly run

Lifecycle rule we apply tonight

Production safety: Transitions run on object age — nothing moves tonight unless objects are already that old. Script merges this rule into existing lifecycle config without deleting other rules.

Exam minimums (write in notes)

• Standard → Standard-IA: object at least 30 days in current class before transition.
• Standard-IA has 30-day minimum storage charge per object.
• Glacier retrieval is a separate line item — lifecycle saves storage $, not retrieval $.
• Intelligent-Tiering monitoring fee per object — worth it when access is unpredictable.

Decision tree (memorize)

Object in S3?
│
├─ Hot / unpredictable access?
│     → Standard or Intelligent-Tiering
│
├─ Infrequent, still ms GET?
│     → Standard-IA (or One Zone-IA if reproducible)
│
├─ Archive, hours retrieval OK?
│     → Glacier Flexible or Deep Archive
│
└─ Aging automatically?
      → Lifecycle transitions + optional expiration

Block 2 (~60 min) — Lab: lifecycle + Cost Explorer + Budget

Prerequisites

Spend note: Lifecycle config is free. Budget alerts are free; charges still accrue — budget does not cap spend. Cost Explorer API is free for standard reports.

What the lab creates

Does not change: Iceland ECS task, EventBridge rules, object storage class immediately, or non-iceland/ prefixes.

Run the lab

# PowerShell — from repo root
.\HTML\study-lab\night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-setup.ps1
.\HTML\study-lab\night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-setup.ps1 -UploadDemoObjects -CreateBudget -BudgetEmail you@example.com

# Git Bash / WSL
bash HTML/study-lab/night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-setup.sh
bash HTML/study-lab/night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-setup.sh --upload-demo --create-budget --budget-email you@example.com

End-to-end validation

1. Result file: night-30-s3-lifecycle-result.json — rule ID, bucket, top 5 services by cost.

2. S3 console: Bucket → Management → Lifecycle rules → saa-study-night30-iceland-archive → verify transitions at 90 / 365 days on prefix iceland/.

3. List prefixes: aws s3 ls s3://globalskiatlas-backend-k8s-output/iceland/ — note monthly folders from Nights 10–12.

4. Cost Explorer (CLI output): Script prints top services last 30 days — compare NAT Gateway vs S3 vs RDS in your account.

5. Budget (optional): AWS Billing → Budgets → saa-study-night30-monthly → confirm email subscription if pending.

Troubleshoot in this order:

1. AccessDenied on bucket? You need s3:GetLifecycleConfiguration + s3:PutLifecycleConfiguration on the bucket — use the GSA admin role or study account.
2. Lifecycle merge failed? Check for malformed existing rules — script saves previous config path in result file.
3. Cost Explorer empty? New accounts need 24 h of data — rerun next day.
4. Budget create failed? Verify -BudgetEmail and budgets:ModifyBudget permission.
5. NoncurrentVersionTransitions skipped? Expected if bucket versioning is Suspended — script omits that block.

Console reading (10 min)

• S3 → globalskiatlas-backend-k8s-output → Metrics → Storage — total bytes (compare after future lifecycle runs).
• Billing → Cost Explorer → filter Service = S3 vs EC2-Other (NAT) vs RDS.
• S3 Storage Lens (optional read-only) — incomplete multipart uploads awareness.

Reference files

• night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-setup.ps1 / .sh — merge lifecycle + Cost Explorer + optional budget
• night-30-lifecycle-rule.json — rule body merged by scripts
• gsa-s3-lifecycle-map.md — bucket/prefix map
• night-29-week-4-review.md — storage class decision tree (Block 1)

Teardown

.\HTML\study-lab\night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-teardown.ps1

bash HTML/study-lab/night-30-lab-s3-lifecycle-teardown.sh

Removes only the saa-study-night30-iceland-archive lifecycle rule, optional demo prefix objects, and study budget. Does not delete iceland/ pipeline output or other lifecycle rules.

Block 3 (~30 min) — Quiz + cost pillar notes

File: night-30-quiz.json — 15 timed scenario questions (~24 min at 96 sec each).

Score on the study site: /aws-solutions-architect-study/quiz/30/.

Write one cost win per tier:

Week 5 map (started)

5 flashcards (write tonight)

1. Standard vs Standard-IA — When is IA wrong for hot iceland/ data?
   (Frequent GET/PUT — retrieval and minimum-duration charges; keep current month Standard.)

2. Lifecycle minimum — Can you transition to Standard-IA on day 1?
   (No — object must satisfy minimum days in current class; exam often says 30.)

3. Glacier — Does lifecycle eliminate retrieval fees?
   (No — storage $ down; restore still billed per GB and tier.)

4. Cost Explorer vs Budget — Which one sends forecast alerts?
   (Budgets — Explorer visualizes; Budgets threshold/forecast notifications.)

5. Iceland durable output — EBS or S3 for archived months?
   (S3 with lifecycle — EBS is scratch on compute only; Night 27/29.)

Night 31 preview

Lab 4B — Fargate right-sizing — compare ecs-task-pipeline-*.json CPU/memory, Savings Plans vs Spot vs On-Demand, read Compute Optimizer recommendations for Iceland task family.

Reference links

• S3 lifecycle configuration
• S3 storage classes
• AWS Cost Explorer
• AWS Budgets