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Amazon Web Services Command Line Interface

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Description and usage of the AWS CLI

Environment

Amazon Web Services Command Line Interface

 

The AWS CLI is an open source tool built on top of the AWS SDK for Python (Boto) that provides commands for interacting with AWS services. With minimal configuration, you can start using all of the functionality provided by the AWS Management Console from your favorite terminal program.

  • Linux shells – Use common shell programs such as Bash, Zsh, and tsch to run commands in Linux, macOS, or Unix.

  • Windows command line – On Microsoft Windows, run commands in either PowerShell or the Windows Command Processor.

  • Remotely – Run commands on Amazon EC2 instances through a remote terminal such as PuTTY or SSH, or with Amazon EC2 systems manager.

The AWS CLI provides direct access to AWS services' public APIs. Explore a service's capabilities with the AWS CLI, and develop shell scripts to manage your resources. Or take what you've learned to develop programs in other languages with the AWS SDK.

In addition to the low level, API equivalent commands, the AWS CLI also provides customizations for several services. Customizations are higher level commands that simplify using a service with a complex API. For example, the aws s3 set of commands provide a familiar syntax for managing files in Amazon S3.

Example Upload a file to Amazon S3

aws s3 cp provides a shell-like copy command, and automatically performs a multipart upload to transfer large files quickly and resiliently.

 
~$ aws s3 cp myvideo.mp4 s3://mybucket/

Performing the same task with the low level commands (available under aws s3api) would take a lot more effort.

Depending on your use case, you may want to use the AWS SDK, a toolkit, or the AWS Tools for Windows PowerShell.

Synopsis

aws [options] <command> <subcommand> [parameters]

Use aws command help for information on a specific command. Use aws help topics to view a list of available help topics. The synopsis for each command shows its parameters and their usage. Optional parameters are shown in square brackets.

Options

--debug (boolean)

Turn on debug logging.

--endpoint-url (string)

Override command's default URL with the given URL.

--no-verify-ssl (boolean)

By default, the AWS CLI uses SSL when communicating with AWS services. For each SSL connection, the AWS CLI will verify SSL certificates. This option overrides the default behavior of verifying SSL certificates.

--no-paginate (boolean)

Disable automatic pagination.

--output (string)

The formatting style for command output.

  • json
  • text
  • table

--query (string)

A JMESPath query to use in filtering the response data.

--profile (string)

Use a specific profile from your credential file.

--region (string)

The region to use. Overrides config/env settings.

--version (string)

Display the version of this tool.

--color (string)

Turn on/off color output.

  • on
  • off
  • auto

--no-sign-request (boolean)

Do not sign requests. Credentials will not be loaded if this argument is provided.

--ca-bundle (string)

The CA certificate bundle to use when verifying SSL certificates. Overrides config/env settings.

--cli-read-timeout (int)

The maximum socket read time in seconds. If the value is set to 0, the socket read will be blocking and not timeout.

--cli-connect-timeout (int)

The maximum socket connect time in seconds. If the value is set to 0, the socket connect will be blocking and not timeout.

Available Services

These commands will take you to the appropriate article at Amazon.

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