AWS S3 Local Development CI/CD Setup That Actually Works

Description and use

A Docker Compose stack with floci/local-aws and GitHub Actions CI provides consistent local and production S3 environments with minimal configuration.

Problem

Developers need a local S3‑compatible service that integrates with CI/CD and behaves like production, but most emulators require complex configuration.

Outcome

The setup starts in ~3 s, uses ~50 MB memory, and achieves 99.9 % reliability in production tests, eliminating configuration drift between local and production.

Workflow

• 1. Create docker-compose.yml with floci/local-aws and expose ports 4566/4572.
• 2. Mount ./data:/data for persistence and set AWS credentials and region env vars.
• 3. Build application service that depends on local‑aws and sets AWS_ENDPOINT_URL to http://local-aws:4566.
• 4. In GitHub Actions, define a service using floci/local-aws image and expose port 4566.
• 5. Checkout code, set up Node.js, install dependencies, and run tests with AWS env vars pointing to localhost:4566.
• 6. Verify tests pass locally and in CI.
• 7. (Optional) Configure CORS on local bucket for browser uploads.
• 8. Persist data across restarts via volume mapping.

Evidence

Zero config for the emulator

Source

Startup time ~3 seconds for the full stack

Source

Reliability 99.9% uptime in production testing

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