Cognito for user authentication in AWS - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Cognito for user authentication

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple web application that needs user login and registration. To manage users securely, you will use AWS Cognito, a service that handles user authentication and user pools.

🎯 Goal: Create an AWS Cognito User Pool with basic settings to enable user sign-up and sign-in.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a Cognito User Pool named exactly MyUserPool

Set the User Pool to allow email as a sign-in alias

Enable self sign-up for users

Configure password policy to require a minimum length of 8 characters

Add an app client named exactly MyUserPoolClient without generating a client secret

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

AWS Cognito is widely used to manage user authentication securely without building your own login system.

💼 Career

Understanding how to configure Cognito user pools is essential for cloud engineers and developers working on secure web and mobile applications.

1

Create the Cognito User Pool resource

Create an AWS Cognito User Pool resource named MyUserPool using AWS CloudFormation syntax. Set the pool name to MyUserPool.

AWS

# Define the AWS::Cognito::UserPool resource named MyUserPool
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use AWS CloudFormation syntax to define a resource of type AWS::Cognito::UserPool with the name MyUserPool.

2

Configure sign-in aliases and enable self sign-up

Add properties to the MyUserPool resource to allow users to sign in using their email address. Also enable self sign-up by setting AllowAdminCreateUserOnly to false.

AWS

Resources:
  MyUserPool:
    Type: AWS::Cognito::UserPool
    Properties:
      UserPoolName: MyUserPool
      # Add sign-in aliases and self sign-up settings here
      # Your code here

Need a hint?

Set UsernameAttributes and AutoVerifiedAttributes to email. To enable self sign-up, set AllowAdminCreateUserOnly to false under AdminCreateUserConfig.

3

Set password policy for the user pool

Add a password policy to the MyUserPool resource that requires a minimum password length of 8 characters.

AWS

Resources:
  MyUserPool:
    Type: AWS::Cognito::UserPool
    Properties:
      UserPoolName: MyUserPool
      UsernameAttributes:
        - email
      AutoVerifiedAttributes:
        - email
      AdminCreateUserConfig:
        AllowAdminCreateUserOnly: false
      # Add password policy here
      # Your code here

Need a hint?

Under Policies, add PasswordPolicy with MinimumLength set to 8.

4

Create an app client for the user pool

Create an AWS Cognito User Pool Client resource named MyUserPoolClient linked to the MyUserPool. Do not generate a client secret.

AWS

Resources:
  MyUserPool:
    Type: AWS::Cognito::UserPool
    Properties:
      UserPoolName: MyUserPool
      UsernameAttributes:
        - email
      AutoVerifiedAttributes:
        - email
      AdminCreateUserConfig:
        AllowAdminCreateUserOnly: false
      Policies:
        PasswordPolicy:
          MinimumLength: 8
  # Define the User Pool Client MyUserPoolClient here
  # Your code here

Need a hint?

Define a resource of type AWS::Cognito::UserPoolClient named MyUserPoolClient. Set UserPoolId to reference MyUserPool and GenerateSecret to false.