aws-ami-builder

AWS AMI Builder

Build Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) using Packer's amazon-ebs builder.

Note: Building AMIs incurs AWS costs (EC2 instances, EBS storage, data transfer). Builds typically take 10-30 minutes depending on provisioning complexity.

Basic AMI Template

packer {
  required_plugins {
    amazon = {
      source  = "github.com/hashicorp/amazon"
      version = "~> 1.3"
    }
  }
}

variable "region" { type = string default = "us-west-2" }

locals { timestamp = regex_replace(timestamp(), "[- TZ:]", "") }

source "amazon-ebs" "ubuntu" { region = var.region instance_type = "t3.micro"

source_ami_filter { filters = { name = "ubuntu/images/ubuntu-jammy-22.04-amd64-server-" root-device-type = "ebs" virtualization-type = "hvm" } most_recent = true owners = ["099720109477"] # Canonical }

ssh_username = "ubuntu" ami_name = "my-app-${local.timestamp}"

tags = { Name = "my-app" BuildDate = local.timestamp } }

build { sources = ["source.amazon-ebs.ubuntu"]

provisioner "shell" { inline = [ "sudo apt-get update", "sudo apt-get upgrade -y", ] } }


## Common Source AMI Filters

### Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
```hcl
source_ami_filter {
  filters = {
    name                = "ubuntu/images/*ubuntu-jammy-22.04-amd64-server-*"
    root-device-type    = "ebs"
    virtualization-type = "hvm"
  }
  most_recent = true
  owners      = ["099720109477"] # Canonical
}

Amazon Linux 2023

source_ami_filter {
  filters = {
    name                = "al2023-ami-*-x86_64"
    root-device-type    = "ebs"
    virtualization-type = "hvm"
  }
  most_recent = true
  owners      = ["amazon"]
}

Multi-Region AMI

source "amazon-ebs" "ubuntu" {
  region        = "us-west-2"
  instance_type = "t3.micro"

  source_ami_filter {
    filters = {
      name = "ubuntu/images/*ubuntu-jammy-22.04-amd64-server-*"
    }
    most_recent = true
    owners      = ["099720109477"]
  }

  ssh_username = "ubuntu"
  ami_name     = "my-app-${local.timestamp}"

  # Copy to additional regions
  ami_regions = ["us-east-1", "us-east-2", "eu-west-1"]
}

Authentication

Packer uses AWS credential resolution:

Environment variables: AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID, AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
AWS credentials file: ~/.aws/credentials
IAM instance profile (when running on EC2)

export AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID="your-access-key"
export AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY="your-secret-key"
export AWS_REGION="us-west-2"

packer build .

Build Commands

# Initialize plugins
packer init .

# Validate template
packer validate .

# Build AMI
packer build .

# Build with variables
packer build -var "region=us-east-1" .

Common Issues

SSH Timeout

Ensure security group allows SSH (port 22)
Verify subnet has internet access

AMI Already Exists

AMI names must be unique
Use timestamp in name: my-app-${local.timestamp}

Volume Size Too Small

Check source AMI's volume size
Set launch_block_device_mappings.volume_size accordingly

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