Updating and deleting stacks in AWS - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Updating and Deleting AWS CloudFormation Stacks

📖 Scenario: You are managing cloud resources using AWS CloudFormation. You need to update an existing stack to change its configuration and then delete it when it is no longer needed.

🎯 Goal: Learn how to update an AWS CloudFormation stack by modifying its template and then delete the stack safely.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an initial CloudFormation stack with a simple resource

Add a configuration parameter to the stack

Update the stack to change the resource configuration

Delete the stack cleanly

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

CloudFormation stacks are used to manage and automate cloud resources in AWS. Updating and deleting stacks is a common task when managing infrastructure as code.

💼 Career

Knowing how to update and delete CloudFormation stacks is essential for cloud engineers and DevOps professionals to maintain and evolve cloud infrastructure safely.

1

Create an initial CloudFormation stack

Create a CloudFormation template string variable called template_body with a simple AWS S3 bucket resource named MyBucket. Then create a stack named MyTestStack using the AWS CLI command aws cloudformation create-stack with the --stack-name MyTestStack and --template-body parameters using the template_body variable.

AWS

# Define the CloudFormation template and create the stack
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Define the template as a JSON string with one S3 bucket resource. Use the AWS CLI command to create the stack with the given name and template.

2

Add a configuration parameter to the stack template

Add a parameter named BucketName of type String to the template_body variable. Modify the MyBucket resource to use this parameter as its BucketName property.

AWS

template_body = '''
# Add Parameters section and update MyBucket resource
# Your code here
'''

Need a hint?

Add a Parameters section with BucketName as a string. Reference this parameter in the bucket's BucketName property.

3

Update the stack with a new bucket name

Use the AWS CLI command aws cloudformation update-stack to update the stack named MyTestStack with the modified template_body. Pass the parameter BucketName with the value my-updated-bucket using the --parameters option.

AWS

template_body = '''
{
  "AWSTemplateFormatVersion": "2010-09-09",
  "Parameters": {
    "BucketName": {
      "Type": "String"
    }
  },
  "Resources": {
    "MyBucket": {
      "Type": "AWS::S3::Bucket",
      "Properties": {
        "BucketName": { "Ref": "BucketName" }
      }
    }
  }
}
'''

# Use AWS CLI update-stack command with parameter BucketName=my-updated-bucket
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use the update-stack command with the same stack name and template file. Pass the new BucketName parameter value.

4

Delete the CloudFormation stack

Use the AWS CLI command aws cloudformation delete-stack to delete the stack named MyTestStack.

AWS

template_body = '''
{
  "AWSTemplateFormatVersion": "2010-09-09",
  "Parameters": {
    "BucketName": {
      "Type": "String"
    }
  },
  "Resources": {
    "MyBucket": {
      "Type": "AWS::S3::Bucket",
      "Properties": {
        "BucketName": { "Ref": "BucketName" }
      }
    }
  }
}
'''

# Use AWS CLI delete-stack command to remove MyTestStack
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use the delete-stack command with the stack name to remove the stack and its resources.