A bucket is a container in Amazon S3 into which files are uploaded. To use Amazon S3 to store a file, you need to create at least one bucket. The bucket name should be unique because it is shared by all users. Files (objects) are stored in buckets. Buckets can contain nested folders and subfolders. But they cannot contain nested buckets. You can create a maximum of 100 buckets in a single account.

The bucket name that you specify can contain letters, numbers, periods, and dashes. The name should start with a letter or a number, and it should be between 3 characters and 63 characters long. A bucket doesn't restrict the user to a size limit.

Click on the Create Bucket button seen in the preceding screenshot, and a dialog box for creating a bucket pops up, as shown in the following image:

We created a bucket named sg-bucket-2015, with the region as Singapore; Amazon S3 allows us to create region-specific buckets. This will also be the region from where your Amazon S3 objects...

The folders in Amazon S3 are S3 files that are used to put Amazon S3 objects together under one group. The S3 folders are similar to the file system in computers. Nested folders can be created. Permissions can also be levied on folders, as in the case of Amazon S3 objects. Folders are just treated as a prefix to the objects—they are used as the key name prefix for the objects.

As you can see in the preceding screenshot, we have created a folder named sg-folder. Once the folder name is given, you cannot rename it. You can create and delete folders. You can even make a folder and its objects accessible to the public.

As seen in the preceding screenshot, under the folder tab, we have an option to:

So, using the Create Folder… option, we can create folders within the folder.

A folder can be made publicly accessible by clicking on the Make Public option:

You can delete the folder when you don't need it anymore, as shown in the following...

In the bucket/folder section, there is an option to create a folder or upload an object:

Clicking on Upload displays a pop-up window, which allows the user to select the Add Files or Upload Folder options using Enable Enhanced Uploader (BETA):

We added the files index.html, index-1.html, and index-2.html using Add Files. Look at the listing of the files under the sg-folder folder in the following screenshot:

While adding files, you can also set the details, permissions, and metadata for the group of files that is being added. However, you can even set the details, permissions, and metadata after the files have been uploaded.

There are two options under the Set Details section:

Versioning enables us to store different versions of an object. It helps us to store, retrieve, and restore old objects. This can be useful when we accidentally delete or modify an object. In such a case, we can restore the last stable object. If we delete an object, Amazon S3 inserts a delete marker for that object rather than deleting it permanently. If we overwrite the object, Amazon S3 creates a new version of the same.

Versioning can be done in any of the following states:

To enable versioning, click on the bucket and under the Properties tab, click on the Versioning tree:

When we click on Enable Versioning, it asks for confirmation. Since storing many versions of an object would cost a lot, it is better to define the lifecycle rules for the object.