One of the fastest ways to start utilizing storage services in the cloud such as AWS S3 storage is by using AWS File Storage Gateway.
File Storage Gateway is a hybrid cloud storage service that provides on-premises access to virtually unlimited cloud storage in AWS S3. It presents one or more AWS S3 buckets and their objects as a mountable NFS or SMB share to one or more clients on-premises. In effect, you have an on-premises NAS, which keeps hot data locally, but the backend connects to AWS S3 where data ultimately resides. The main advantages of using File Storage Gateway are:
- Data on AWS S3 can be tiered and life cycled into cost-effective storage
- Data can be processed on both on-prem and in AWS, using on-prem legacy applications and Amazon EC2-based applications
- Data can be shared by users located in multiple geographic locations
One disadvantage of using File Storage Gateway is that it is not optimized for large number of users/connections. It is designed for small number of users (about 100 connections per gateway), but high volume of data (in TB o PB scale).