Signing up

This step is, of course, fairly simple and self-explanatory. In order to sign up, if you haven't done so yet, open https://portal.aws.amazon.com/gp/aws/developer/registration/ in your browser and follow the steps. You will need an email address and your credit card information.

There are two exceptions to this process, as follows:

• If you plan on deploying servers in China, then you need to create your account on https://www.amazonaws.cn/.
• AWS has a special facility called GovCloud for the specific regulatory needs of United States federal, state, and local agencies. To sign up for this, use the link https://aws.amazon.com/govcloud-us/contact/.

Amazon runs a free tier program for new users. It's designed to help you discover their services free of charge. Amazon gives free credit on most services. It is likely that over time the offer will change, so this book isn't going to cover the specificity of this offer, but the details are available at https://aws.amazon.com/free/.

Once you're done with the sign-up process, you will be sent to the AWS Management Console landing page. This screen can be a bit overwhelming as Amazon now has a lot of services, but you will quickly get used to it. If you are a fan of bookmarks, this page is definitely a prime candidate:

The account you just created is called a root account. This account will always have full access to all your resources. Because of this, make sure to keep your password in a safe place. The best practice is to use the root account only to create the initial user through the IAM service that we will discover shortly. In addition, it is strongly recommended to switch to multi-factor authentication (MFA) and use the Identity and Access Management (IAM) service to manage user accounts, so pick a relatively complex password.