[SOLVED] move S3 files with Glacier storage class to a different folder

move S3 files with Glacier storage class to a different folder

We have a good amount of files that were on the wrong folder in S3 but has since transitioned to Glacier storage class. First thing is we want to restore them so we can move them to the right folders. Once moved we transition it back to Glacier storage class. The main question is, do those files get duplicated on the Glacier side? Since restoring them (to Standard) doesn't mean that they're being deleted or moved on the Glacier side. How do we verify that they are not duplicated after moving to a different folder in the Standard class?

Solution

Amazon S3 objects are immutable. You cannot "move" objects in S3 or Glacier.

The process would be:

Restore the objects from Glacier storage class
Rename/move them: This actually doesn't happen. Rather, the objects are copied to the new Key and then the original object is deleted. Using "Rename" in the console does this for you, as does the AWS CLI aws mv command.
Create a lifecycle rule to transition them to Glacier storage class

From CopyObject - Amazon Simple Storage Service:

If the source object's storage class is GLACIER, you must restore a copy of this object before you can use it as a source object for the copy operation.