How I Turned AWS S3 Chaos Into “Google Drive for Pros” (Thanks to ChatGPT)

ChatGPT for me at 73 has been like hiring the best, most patient coach available... to learn whatever I want to do for only pennies a day.

Dear Son,

If you’d been standing over my shoulder last week, you’d have heard a lot of muttering… and probably a few words you won’t find in the Sunday school hymnal.

I was in the middle of one of those technical “should be simple” jobs: setting up AWS S3 so I could store and share files from my own bucket — no expiring links, no middlemen, just mine.
You know, like Google Drive for pros, but with my name on the door.

The Pain Points

Before ChatGPT got involved, here’s where I was:

• AWS’s interface is a maze. One wrong click and you’re in “Identity Center” instead of “IAM Users” — which is like trying to order a burger at a vegan café.

• I had eight buckets, none set up exactly right for public downloads.

• The one bucket I thought was public kept spitting back cryptic XML “AccessDenied” messages.

• I knew I needed a safe IAM user for uploads through CloudBerry, but AWS permissions read like legalese written by a bored robot.

• And testing? Forget it. I was in “upload, try, fail, repeat” mode — the kind of cycle that makes you question your life choices.

Enter ChatGPT

Here’s where it turned around:
I told ChatGPT exactly what I wanted:

“I want an S3 bucket from scratch for public file hosting. Exact settings so anything I upload is instantly downloadable. A minimal safe IAM user for CloudBerry. And a way to test so I know the link works before I share it.”

And then — step-by-step — it walked me through:

1. Making the bucket public the right way
   No ACL juggling. Just owner-enforced, block-public-access turned off, and a clean bucket policy that never needs to be touched again.

2. Creating two IAM users with clear purposes

   • FredFerguson — my full-power, “everything works” admin.

   • cloudberry-triggerpoint — limited to one bucket for safe, focused uploads.

3. Writing the perfect JSON policy for the limited user
   It even spotted why CloudBerry was showing me a blank “root” (missing ListAllMyBuckets).

4. Testing every step
   Upload file → grab URL → open in incognito → see it load instantly.
   No more mystery errors.

5. Finishing with a custom PDF runbook so I can (or anyone can) repeat the process without starting over.

What Made This Different

It wasn’t just “here’s the documentation” — it was question, answer, action, test.
Every time I hit a wall, I’d ask:

• “I can’t see X…” → fix.

• “It says AccessDenied…” → fix.

• “CloudBerry is blank…” → fix.

That loop — ask, get specific instructions, test immediately — is what made the difference.

The Value

That one coaching session was worth more to me than the cost of an entire year of ChatGPT Plus.
Why? Because it saved me from wasting days in frustration, and it gave me a working system I trust to run my business.

I went from “I’ll figure this out someday” to “Paydirt!” in a single guided session.

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Son, if I had one…
This is how you approach any gnarly technical project:

1. Get clear on what you want the end state to look like.

2. Ask for step-by-step guidance.

3. Test at each step so nothing gets buried.

4. Document your success for the next time.

Tools like ChatGPT aren’t just about writing; they’re about building — and having a patient coach that never rolls its eyes when you ask, “Wait, where do I click?”

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