I attempted to migrate a website from GCP to AWS Lightsail and then back again in order to gain a better understanding of the process. However, I discovered that the process was not as straightforward than I initially thought.
Steps I followed for migrating to AWS:
- I set up an AWS Lightsail instance.
- I directed the A record to point to the AWS Lightsail instance.
- I installed a Letsencrypt SSL certificate at the server level.
Steps I followed for migrating back to GCP:
- I restarted the GCP VM (I retained the source VM on GCP without deletion).
- I checked that the Google-managed SSL certificate remained active.
- I redirected the A record to point back to the GCP VM.
- I stopped the AWS Lightsail instance.
- However, the website failed to load due to an invalid SSL certificate.
- I verified with an SSL checker, and it correctly resolved to the GCP VM.
- I deleted the Google managed SSL and recreate it
Is it necessary to recreate a Google-managed SSL certificate when switching the SSL resolution to a different provider?
From my personal experience(not much though), the downtime involved in using Google managed SSL certificate is quite significant. Once you've used it, it appears to adopt a "vendor-locked" framework.
