Glossary

Access Key ID

An identifier associated with your Secret Access Key. Used for request authentication.

active trusted signers

A list showing each of the trusted signers you've specified and the IDs of the corresponding active key pairs that CloudFront is aware of. To be able to create working signed URLs, a trusted signer must appear in this list with at least one key pair ID.

bucket

A container for objects stored in Amazon S3.

CloudFront origin access identity

See origin access identity

distribution

The representation of the relationship between an origin server and the corresponding domain name, and associated configuration information.

edge location

One of the sites Amazon CloudFront uses to cache copies of your content for faster delivery to end users.

eviction

When Amazon CloudFront deletes an object from an edge location before its expiration time.

expiration

When Amazon CloudFront stops serving an object from an edge location. The next time the edge location needs to serve that object, CloudFront goes to the origin server to get a new copy.

object

A file stored in Amazon S3.

origin access identity

A virtual identity you use when giving your distribution permission to fetch a private object from your origin server bucket.

origin server

The Amazon S3 bucket containing the definitive original version of the content you're making available through Amazon CloudFront.

range GET

If an end user sends a byte-range GET request for an object that isn't cached in the edge location, Amazon CloudFront fetches only the specified range from the origin and then serves the request. It doesn't cache either the range or the full object.

Secret Access Key

A key that Amazon Web Services (AWS) assigns to you when you sign up for an AWS account. Used for request authentication.

streaming

The use of a media file in real time as it is being transmitted in a steady stream from the server.

streaming distribution

A special kind of distribution that serves streamed media files using a Real-Time Messaging Protocol (RTMP) connection.

trusted signers

AWS accounts you've given permission to create signed URLs for a given distribution's content.