Lab 01 - Web Access I
Difficulty: Beginner Service: Amazon EC2
Cost: This lab uses a t2.micro instance (Free Tier eligible). If left running outside the Free Tier, the cost is approximately $0.30/day. Delete the stack when you are done.
Scenario
Your team deployed a web server on EC2. The CloudFormation stack completed successfully and the instance is running — but the page won’t load in the browser.
What Was Deployed
| Resource | Purpose |
|---|---|
AWS::EC2::VPC |
Dedicated VPC for the lab |
AWS::EC2::Subnet |
Public subnet with internet access |
AWS::EC2::InternetGateway |
Internet gateway attached to the VPC |
AWS::EC2::RouteTable |
Route table with a default route to the internet |
AWS::EC2::SecurityGroup |
Security group for the instance |
AWS::EC2::Instance |
t2.micro running Amazon Linux 2023 with Apache web server |
The stack deployed without errors. Apache is installed and running on the instance.
Deploy the Lab
- Open the AWS CloudFormation console
- Click Create stack > With new resources (standard)
- Select Upload a template file and upload lab-01-web-access-i.yaml
- Enter a stack name (e.g.,
brokenlabs-ec2-lab-01) and click Next > Next > Submit - Wait for the stack status to reach CREATE_COMPLETE (takes 2–3 minutes)
- Open the stack Outputs tab — you will see
InstanceId,InstancePublicIP, andWebPageURL
The Problem
Open the WebPageURL from the stack Outputs in your browser.
Expected: the AWS Broken Labs welcome page loads. Actual: the browser displays:
This site can't be reached
ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT
The instance is running and shows a healthy status in the EC2 console.
Fix the Lab
Diagnose why the problem occurs and fix it so the result matches Expected above.
Need help? Open hints.md for progressive hints.
Cleanup
- Open CloudFormation, select your stack, and click Delete
- Wait for the stack to reach DELETE_COMPLETE (or disappear from the list)
- Verify in the EC2 console that the instance no longer appears (or shows Terminated)