Level 0 of my DevOps journey

Source: Dev.to

Level 0 DevOps Summary: What I’ve Done

1. Created and Connected to an EC2 Instance

• Launched an AWS EC2 instance (Linux‑based).
• Connected using WSL on the local machine.
• Verified login and command execution on the server.

2. Configured SSH for Easy Access

• Updated SSH config on WSL (~/.ssh/config) to simplify connections.
• Corrected HostName usage (only hostname/IP, not username).
• Set key permissions (chmod 600) for secure SSH access.
• Created an alias ec2-dev:

Host ec2-dev
    HostName ec-100-27-225-48.compute-1.amazonaws.com
    User ec2-user
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/server.pem
    IdentitiesOnly yes

3. Configured SSH on Windows

• Updated C:\Users\alok\.ssh\config for PowerShell access.
• Adjusted IdentityFile to use the full Windows path:

IdentityFile C:\Users\alok\.ssh\server.pem

• Fixed permissions and verified connections.
• Tested connecting via ssh ec2-dev in PowerShell successfully.

4. Connected to EC2 from VS Code

• Installed the Remote - SSH extension.
• Configured VS Code to use the same SSH config file.
• Connected to EC2 from VS Code, enabling editor, terminal, and file access directly on the remote server.

5. Key Takeaways / Level 0 Achievements

• SSH access to EC2 from WSL, Windows, and VS Code.
• Understanding of SSH config, host aliases, and identity files.
• Ability to start remote development, scripting, and deployments.
• Foundation for automating tasks, using Git, and deploying applications.

At this point you have full remote access setup, which is the foundation of all DevOps work. Everything from CI/CD pipelines to automation and deployment starts here.