amazon.aws.cloudformation module – Create or delete an AWS CloudFormation stack

Note

This module is part of the amazon.aws collection (version 9.0.0).

You might already have this collection installed if you are using the ansible package. It is not included in ansible-core. To check whether it is installed, run ansible-galaxy collection list.

To install it, use: ansible-galaxy collection install amazon.aws. You need further requirements to be able to use this module, see Requirements for details.

To use it in a playbook, specify: amazon.aws.cloudformation.

New in amazon.aws 1.0.0

Synopsis

  • Launches or updates an AWS CloudFormation stack and waits for it complete.

Requirements

The below requirements are needed on the host that executes this module.

  • python >= 3.6

  • boto3 >= 1.28.0

  • botocore >= 1.31.0

Parameters

Parameter

Comments

access_key

aliases: aws_access_key_id, aws_access_key, ec2_access_key

string

AWS access key ID.

See the AWS documentation for more information about access tokens https://docs.aws.amazon.com/general/latest/gr/aws-sec-cred-types.html#access-keys-and-secret-access-keys.

The AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID, AWS_ACCESS_KEY or EC2_ACCESS_KEY environment variables may also be used in decreasing order of preference.

The aws_access_key and profile options are mutually exclusive.

The aws_access_key_id alias was added in release 5.1.0 for consistency with the AWS botocore SDK.

The ec2_access_key alias has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

Support for the EC2_ACCESS_KEY environment variable has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

aws_ca_bundle

path

The location of a CA Bundle to use when validating SSL certificates.

The AWS_CA_BUNDLE environment variable may also be used.

aws_config

dictionary

A dictionary to modify the botocore configuration.

Parameters can be found in the AWS documentation https://botocore.amazonaws.com/v1/documentation/api/latest/reference/config.html#botocore.config.Config.

backoff_delay

integer

Number of seconds to wait for the next retry.

Default: 3

backoff_max_delay

integer

Maximum amount of time to wait between retries.

Default: 30

backoff_retries

integer

Number of times to retry operation.

AWS API throttling mechanism fails CloudFormation module so we have to retry a couple of times.

Default: 10

capabilities

list / elements=string

Specify capabilities that stack template contains.

Valid values are CAPABILITY_IAM, CAPABILITY_NAMED_IAM and CAPABILITY_AUTO_EXPAND.

Default: ["CAPABILITY_IAM", "CAPABILITY_NAMED_IAM"]

changeset_name

string

Name given to the changeset when creating a changeset.

Only used when create_changeset=true.

By default a name prefixed with Ansible-STACKNAME is generated based on input parameters. See the AWS Change Sets docs for more information https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/using-cfn-updating-stacks-changesets.html

create_changeset

boolean

If stack already exists create a changeset instead of directly applying changes. See the AWS Change Sets docs https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/using-cfn-updating-stacks-changesets.html.

WARNING: if the stack does not exist, it will be created without changeset. If state=absent, the stack will be deleted immediately with no changeset.

Choices:

  • false ← (default)

  • true

create_timeout

integer

The amount of time (in minutes) that can pass before the stack status becomes CREATE_FAILED.

debug_botocore_endpoint_logs

boolean

Use a botocore.endpoint logger to parse the unique (rather than total) "resource:action" API calls made during a task, outputing the set to the resource_actions key in the task results. Use the aws_resource_action callback to output to total list made during a playbook.

The ANSIBLE_DEBUG_BOTOCORE_LOGS environment variable may also be used.

Choices:

  • false ← (default)

  • true

disable_rollback

boolean

If a stacks fails to form, rollback will remove the stack.

Choices:

  • false ← (default)

  • true

endpoint_url

aliases: ec2_url, aws_endpoint_url, s3_url

string

URL to connect to instead of the default AWS endpoints. While this can be used to connection to other AWS-compatible services the amazon.aws and community.aws collections are only tested against AWS.

The AWS_URL or EC2_URL environment variables may also be used, in decreasing order of preference.

The ec2_url and s3_url aliases have been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

Support for the EC2_URL environment variable has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

events_limit

integer

Maximum number of CloudFormation events to fetch from a stack when creating or updating it.

Default: 200

notification_arns

string

A comma separated list of Simple Notification Service (SNS) topic ARNs to publish stack related events.

on_create_failure

string

Action to take upon failure of stack creation. Incompatible with the disable_rollback option.

Choices:

  • "DO_NOTHING"

  • "ROLLBACK"

  • "DELETE"

profile

aliases: aws_profile

string

A named AWS profile to use for authentication.

See the AWS documentation for more information about named profiles https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/userguide/cli-configure-profiles.html.

The AWS_PROFILE environment variable may also be used.

The profile option is mutually exclusive with the aws_access_key, aws_secret_key and security_token options.

region

aliases: aws_region, ec2_region

string

The AWS region to use.

For global services such as IAM, Route53 and CloudFront, region is ignored.

The AWS_REGION or EC2_REGION environment variables may also be used.

See the Amazon AWS documentation for more information http://docs.aws.amazon.com/general/latest/gr/rande.html#ec2_region.

The ec2_region alias has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01

Support for the EC2_REGION environment variable has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

role_arn

string

The role that AWS CloudFormation assumes to create the stack. See the AWS CloudFormation Service Role docs https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/using-iam-servicerole.html

secret_key

aliases: aws_secret_access_key, aws_secret_key, ec2_secret_key

string

AWS secret access key.

See the AWS documentation for more information about access tokens https://docs.aws.amazon.com/general/latest/gr/aws-sec-cred-types.html#access-keys-and-secret-access-keys.

The AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY, AWS_SECRET_KEY, or EC2_SECRET_KEY environment variables may also be used in decreasing order of preference.

The secret_key and profile options are mutually exclusive.

The aws_secret_access_key alias was added in release 5.1.0 for consistency with the AWS botocore SDK.

The ec2_secret_key alias has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

Support for the EC2_SECRET_KEY environment variable has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

session_token

aliases: aws_session_token, security_token, aws_security_token, access_token

string

AWS STS session token for use with temporary credentials.

See the AWS documentation for more information about access tokens https://docs.aws.amazon.com/general/latest/gr/aws-sec-cred-types.html#access-keys-and-secret-access-keys.

The AWS_SESSION_TOKEN, AWS_SECURITY_TOKEN or EC2_SECURITY_TOKEN environment variables may also be used in decreasing order of preference.

The security_token and profile options are mutually exclusive.

Aliases aws_session_token and session_token were added in release 3.2.0, with the parameter being renamed from security_token to session_token in release 6.0.0.

The security_token, aws_security_token, and access_token aliases have been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

Support for the EC2_SECRET_KEY and AWS_SECURITY_TOKEN environment variables has been deprecated and will be removed in a release after 2024-12-01.

stack_name

string / required

Name of the CloudFormation stack.

stack_policy

string

The path of the file containing the CloudFormation stack policy. A policy cannot be removed once placed, but it can be modified. for instance, allow all updates https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/protect-stack-resources.html#d0e9051

stack_policy_body

json

added in amazon.aws 1.5.0

The CloudFormation stack policy in JSON. A policy cannot be removed once placed, but it can be modified. for instance, allow all updates https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/protect-stack-resources.html#d0e9051

stack_policy_on_update_body

json

added in amazon.aws 1.5.0

The body of the cloudformation stack policy only applied during this update.

state

string

If state=present, stack will be created.

If state=present and if stack exists and template has changed, it will be updated.

If state=absent, stack will be removed.

Choices:

  • "present" ← (default)

  • "absent"

tags

dictionary

Dictionary of tags to associate with stack and its resources during stack creation.

Can be updated later, updating tags removes previous entries.

template

path

The local path of the CloudFormation template.

This must be the full path to the file, relative to the working directory. If using roles this may look like roles/cloudformation/files/cloudformation-example.json.

If state=present and the stack does not exist yet, either template, template_body or template_url must be specified (but only one of them).

If state=present, the stack does exist, and neither template, template_body nor template_url are specified, the previous template will be reused.

The template parameter has been deprecated and will be remove in a release after 2026-05-01. It is recommended to use template_body with the ansible.builtin.template lookup plugin.

template_body

string

Template body. Use this to pass in the actual body of the CloudFormation template.

If state=present and the stack does not exist yet, either template, template_body or template_url must be specified (but only one of them).

If state=present, the stack does exist, and neither template, template_body nor template_url are specified, the previous template will be reused.

template_parameters

dictionary

A list of hashes of all the template variables for the stack. The value can be a string or a dict.

Dict can be used to set additional template parameter attributes like UsePreviousValue (see example).

Default: {}

template_url

string

Location of file containing the template body. The URL must point to a template (max size 307,200 bytes) located in an S3 bucket in the same region as the stack.

If state=present and the stack does not exist yet, either template, template_body or template_url must be specified (but only one of them).

If state=present, the stack does exist, and neither template, template_body nor template_url are specified, the previous template will be reused.

termination_protection

boolean

Enable or disable termination protection on the stack.

Choices:

  • false

  • true

validate_certs

boolean

When set to false, SSL certificates will not be validated for communication with the AWS APIs.

Setting validate_certs=false is strongly discouraged, as an alternative, consider setting aws_ca_bundle instead.

Choices:

  • false

  • true ← (default)

Notes

Note

  • Caution: For modules, environment variables and configuration files are read from the Ansible ‘host’ context and not the ‘controller’ context. As such, files may need to be explicitly copied to the ‘host’. For lookup and connection plugins, environment variables and configuration files are read from the Ansible ‘controller’ context and not the ‘host’ context.

  • The AWS SDK (boto3) that Ansible uses may also read defaults for credentials and other settings, such as the region, from its configuration files in the Ansible ‘host’ context (typically ~/.aws/credentials). See https://boto3.amazonaws.com/v1/documentation/api/latest/guide/credentials.html for more information.

Examples

- name: create a cloudformation stack
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: "ansible-cloudformation"
    state: "present"
    region: "us-east-1"
    disable_rollback: true
    # The template parameter has been deprecated, use template_body with lookup instead.
    # template: "files/cloudformation-example.json"
    template_body: "{{ lookup('file', 'cloudformation-example.json') }}"
    template_parameters:
      KeyName: "jmartin"
      DiskType: "ephemeral"
      InstanceType: "m1.small"
      ClusterSize: 3
    tags:
      Stack: "ansible-cloudformation"

# Basic role example
- name: create a stack, specify role that cloudformation assumes
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: "ansible-cloudformation"
    state: "present"
    region: "us-east-1"
    disable_rollback: true
    # The template parameter has been deprecated, use template_body with lookup instead.
    # template: "roles/cloudformation/files/cloudformation-example.json"
    template_body: "{{ lookup('file', 'cloudformation-example.json') }}"
    role_arn: 'arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/cloudformation-iam-role'

- name: delete a stack
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: "ansible-cloudformation-old"
    state: "absent"

# Create a stack, pass in template from a URL, disable rollback if stack creation fails,
# pass in some parameters to the template, provide tags for resources created
- name: create a stack, pass in the template via an URL
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: "ansible-cloudformation"
    state: present
    region: us-east-1
    disable_rollback: true
    template_url: https://s3.amazonaws.com/my-bucket/cloudformation.template
    template_parameters:
      KeyName: jmartin
      DiskType: ephemeral
      InstanceType: m1.small
      ClusterSize: 3
    tags:
      Stack: ansible-cloudformation

# Create a stack, passing in template body using lookup of Jinja2 template, disable rollback if stack creation fails,
# pass in some parameters to the template, provide tags for resources created
- name: create a stack, pass in the template body via lookup template
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: "ansible-cloudformation"
    state: present
    region: us-east-1
    disable_rollback: true
    template_body: "{{ lookup('template', 'cloudformation.j2') }}"
    template_parameters:
      KeyName: jmartin
      DiskType: ephemeral
      InstanceType: m1.small
      ClusterSize: 3
    tags:
      Stack: ansible-cloudformation

# Pass a template parameter which uses CloudFormation's UsePreviousValue attribute
# When use_previous_value is set to True, the given value will be ignored and
# CloudFormation will use the value from a previously submitted template.
# If use_previous_value is set to False (default) the given value is used.
- amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: "ansible-cloudformation"
    state: "present"
    region: "us-east-1"
    template: "files/cloudformation-example.json"
    template_parameters:
      DBSnapshotIdentifier:
        use_previous_value: true
        value: arn:aws:rds:es-east-1:123456789012:snapshot:rds:my-db-snapshot
      DBName:
        use_previous_value: true
    tags:
      Stack: "ansible-cloudformation"

# Enable termination protection on a stack.
# If the stack already exists, this will update its termination protection
- name: enable termination protection during stack creation
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: my_stack
    state: present
    template_url: https://s3.amazonaws.com/my-bucket/cloudformation.template
    termination_protection: true

# Configure TimeoutInMinutes before the stack status becomes CREATE_FAILED
# In this case, if disable_rollback is not set or is set to false, the stack will be rolled back.
- name: enable termination protection during stack creation
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: my_stack
    state: present
    template_url: https://s3.amazonaws.com/my-bucket/cloudformation.template
    create_timeout: 5

# Configure rollback behaviour on the unsuccessful creation of a stack allowing
# CloudFormation to clean up, or do nothing in the event of an unsuccessful
# deployment
# In this case, if on_create_failure is set to "DELETE", it will clean up the stack if
# it fails to create
- name: create stack which will delete on creation failure
  amazon.aws.cloudformation:
    stack_name: my_stack
    state: present
    template_url: https://s3.amazonaws.com/my-bucket/cloudformation.template
    on_create_failure: DELETE

Return Values

Common return values are documented here, the following are the fields unique to this module:

Key

Description

change_set_id

string

The ID of the stack change set when created.

Returned: when state=present and create_changeset=true.

Sample: "arn:aws:cloudformation:us-east-1:123456789012:changeSet/Ansible-StackName-f4496805bd1b2be824d1e315c6884247ede41eb0"

events

list / elements=string

Most recent events in CloudFormation’s event log. This may be from a previous run in some cases.

Returned: always

Sample: ["StackEvent AWS::CloudFormation::Stack stackname UPDATE_COMPLETE", "StackEvent AWS::CloudFormation::Stack stackname UPDATE_COMPLETE_CLEANUP_IN_PROGRESS"]

log

list / elements=string

Debugging logs. Useful when modifying or finding an error.

Returned: always

Sample: ["updating stack"]

stack_outputs

dictionary

A key:value dictionary of all the stack outputs currently defined. If there are no stack outputs, it is an empty dictionary.

Returned: When state=present

Sample: {"MySg": "AnsibleModuleTestYAML-CFTestSg-C8UVS567B6NS"}

stack_resources

list / elements=dictionary

AWS stack resources and their status. List of dictionaries, one dict per resource.

Returned: when state=present

Sample: [{"last_updated_time": "2016-10-11T19:40:14.979000+00:00", "logical_resource_id": "CFTestSg", "physical_resource_id": "cloudformation2-CFTestSg-16UQ4CYQ57O9F", "resource_type": "AWS::EC2::SecurityGroup", "status": "UPDATE_COMPLETE", "status_reason": null}]

Authors

  • James S. Martin (@jsmartin)