After reading an article about Amazon AWS Route 53 taking on Godaddy.com, and running into to a few issues with my WordPress website on Microsoft Azure, I decided to give Amazon AWS a try.

I found creating a Linux VM very easy.  No instructions needed, the UI was very intuitive. I thought creating the WordPress site would be more difficult on AWS.  After all, I had run into a number of challenges with the “automated” WordPress installs on Microsoft Azure (provided by ClearDB and Bitnami).  In short, I spent many hours with tech support from both companies.  Some issues were major, others more trivial – yet still important. For example, Bitnami puts in an annoying “dog ear” in the bottom right corner of the your home page with their logo.  But I digress…

I was pleased to find that creating a WordPress site on AWS (manually) was straight forward.  The instructions were very well written:

 

Tutorial: Installing a LAMP Web Server on Amazon Linux
http://amzn.to/1Shrf4H

Tutorial: Hosting a WordPress Blog with Amazon Linux
http://amzn.to/1Shr9dd

Heading Down Route 53

After getting a default WordPress site up and running (in about 30 minutes).  The next step was to transfer my domain name.  I read the AWS Route 53 domain transfer instructions and had some questions.

Transferring a Domain to Amazon Route 53
http://amzn.to/1ShrgFL

However, I found a nice, brief (~1 minute) video on youtube that answered all my questions.  Kudos to Sibercat X.

The Transfer Process (and the missing step)

In a nutshell, you start your domain transfer to Route 53 by logging on to Godaddy.com and clicking: Manage your domain.  You click on unlock and get an email with your authorization code:

The next step is to plug in your authorization code to the AWS Route 53 console and away you go.

Sitting, Waiting, Wishing

However, 12 hours later, I was still waiting  A check of my AWS Route 53 console reveals the following (step 7 of 14):

I decided to do a quick Google search to figure out what’s taking so long.  After all, this can’t be a manual process, it has to automated end-to-end.  I find the following explanation:

Waiting for the current registrar to complete the transfer (step 7 of 14)

Your current registrar is confirming that your domain meets the requirements for being transferred. Requirements vary among TLDs, but the following requirements are typical:

The first three bullets are straight forward, I know they don’t apply to me.  However, I find the sub bullet status codes cryptic.  Instead of searching Google again, I decide to log back in to Godaddy.com and look around  I click the manage my domain button and voila – I find the problem.  There’s an undocumented step in the transfer instructions. Godaddy.com makes you go back and accept the transfer a second time (even after accepting the initial transfer request link from their email). Here’s what you’ll see in Godaddy.com’s console:

All you need to do is click on Accept and away you go, you’re on to Step 8.

 

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Liner notes.  The title of this article came from a song by Jack Johnson.

 

Lyrics