In this post, we will set up DynamoDB for local development and learn how to use the provided UI to explore the data we work with.

Getting started

Create a new project directory to work within.

Head to the AWS documentation page and download a version of DynamoDB into the project directory.

I will download the Oregon zip file.

Ensure to unzip the folder into the project directory. Within that folder, I am going to move the DynamoDBLocal_lib and DynamoDBLocal.jar file up to the project directory root (you can remove what is left of the folder after if you would like).

Now we can start the DB by running java -Djava.library.path=./DynamoDBLocal_lib -jar DynamoDBLocal.jar -sharedDb.

I am going to add that line as a script in the package.json file: