From Linux Basics to Remote Deployment: A 6 Day DevOps Foundation Project

Oyawole Damilola — Wed, 18 Feb 2026 09:30:01 +0000

I set out to strengthen my DevOps fundamentals by building a structured 6 day hands on project series.I wanted to understand each layer before combining everything into a working remote deployment.

By the end of the week, I had automated the provisioning of a remote Ubuntu EC2 instance, containerized a Flask application, configured Nginx as a reverse proxy, and deployed everything through a single script.

Environment

Ubuntu (local and EC2)
Bash
Docker
Docker Compose
Nginx
AWS EC2
SSH and SCP

Day 1: Linux Essentials

I revisited core Linux concepts including:

File permissions
Services and systemctl
Log inspection
Basic system commands

I wrote a Bash script to check disk usage, memory usage, and uptime. This forced me to understand what the commands were actually doing instead of just running them.
This step reinforced comfort with the terminal, which is non negotiable in DevOps work.

Day 2: Bash Scripting

I focused on:

Variables
Loops
Conditionals
Logging
Basic error handling

Using these, I built a script that installs Docker, Git, and Nginx automatically on an Ubuntu server or container.

Instead of manually installing packages every time, I could now provision a machine with one script. This was my first clear shift from manual work to automation thinking.

Day 3: Docker Fundamentals

I containerized a simple Flask application.
This included:

Writing a Dockerfile
Building the image
Running the container locally

This step clarified how containers package applications and how runtime behavior differs from running an app directly on the host.

Day 4: Docker Compose and Nginx

I extended the setup into a multi container environment. I defined two services in Docker Compose for Flask and Nginx, allowing the containers to communicate over an internal network. Requests were routed through Nginx to Flask and health checks validated service availability.

Seeing traffic flow through the reverse proxy made the networking piece much clearer. It also demonstrated how containers communicate internally within a defined network.

Day 5: SSH Automation

I automated remote script execution using SCP and SSH on EC2 instances.
This involved:

Securely connecting to a remote Ubuntu server
Transferring scripts via SCP
Executing scripts remotely
Managing permissions and environment variables

This step tied local automation to real infrastructure. It moved the project from theory to practical remote execution.

Day 6: Full Deployment

I combined everything into a single script that:

Connects to a remote EC2 Ubuntu instance
Installs Docker and Git
Builds the Flask container
Configures Nginx as a reverse proxy

After execution, the application was accessible through the instance’s public IP address.
That moment validated the full workflow from provisioning to deployment.

This project was intentionally foundational. The goal was not complexity, but correctness and understanding of how the pieces connect.

Repository
All scripts, Docker configurations, and deployment steps are available in my GitHub repository here https://github.com/amilola/30Days-Devops/tree/main/Phase1

DEV Community: Oyawole Damilola

From Linux Basics to Remote Deployment: A 6 Day DevOps Foundation Project