AWS CloudFormation Template Editors for Visual Studio and Eclipse

AWS CloudFormation gives you the power to launch an entire stack of AWS resources using a declarative template. The templates are JSON-formatted text files that define all of the necessary resources, their attributes, and the relationships between them.

Today we are introducing a new CloudFormation editor to make it even easier for you to create the templates using Visual Studio or Eclipse. You can:

• Browse the list of available AWS resources to insert into your template.
• Insert definition blocks for AWS resources that let you fill in the blanks for config.
• Create and update your CloudFormation stacks straight from your template in Visual Studio or Eclipse.

The CloudFormation template editor understands the template format and provides intelligent assistance as you’re editing.  You can use code completion with inline descriptions to quickly find and insert definition blocks for different AWS resources.  Then you simply configure your specific details into the placeholders. The editor will also validate your template as you make changes to identify any problems in the file.  Once you define your templates, you can use them to create and update your stack of AWS resources right from within Visual Studio and Eclipse.

Here are some screen shots of the editor in action, first editing a template:

Second, deploying the finished template:

The editor is available as part of the AWS Toolkit for Visual Studio and the AWS Toolkit for Eclipse. Install the appropriate toolkit now and give it a whirl.

— Jeff;