The document discusses the use of Infrastructure as Code (IaC) through AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK) for streamlining cloud resource management by transforming configurations into code. It highlights the advantages of CDK over traditional methods such as maintaining environment idempotency and simplifying deployment processes while also noting some limitations like unstable services and incomplete documentation. Case studies demonstrate practical applications, including the deployment of a budget and expense manager application.

1. AWS CDK
Developer Centric > Infrastructure as Code > Next Generation
Digital Transformation – 2019 November
Cloud Development Kit

2. © DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AWS CDK 2
KASUN JAYASURIYA
Software Architect @ Digital Transformation
kasundilunika@gmail.com
@dilunika
www.linkedin.com/in/kasundilunika
medium.com/@dilunika
kasun@digitaltransformation.co.nz
@DTL_NZ
www.linkedin.com/company/dtlnz
medium.com/dtlpub

3. PRESENTATION
AGENDA
Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
IaC in Serverless & CDK
Practical Case Study - Piglet
CDK Concepts & Demo
Pros & Cons
01
02
03
04
05

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INFRASTRUCTURE AS CODE
brings your networks, virtual machines, load balancers, and connection topology into some form of source code
Without IaC, teams must maintain the settings of individual deployment
environments. Over time, each environment becomes a snowflake, that is,
a unique configuration that cannot be reproduced automatically.
SOLVE THE PROBLEM OF ENVIRONMENT DRIFT
Idempotence is the property that a deployment command always sets
the target environment into the same configuration, regardless of the
environment’s starting state. Idempotency is achieved by either
automatically configuring an existing target or by discarding the existing
target and recreating a fresh environment.
MAINTAINS IDEMPOTENCY
Accordingly, with IaC, teams make changes to the environment description
and version the configuration model, which is typically in well-documented
code formats such as JSON. The release pipeline executes the model to
configure target environments. If the team needs to make changes, they
edit the source, not the target.
VERSION EVERY CHANGE

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PUBLIC CLOUDS & VENDORS
Their Cloud, Their APIs
AWS APIS & SDK
AWS has exposed majority of their cloud resources publicly
using REST APIs. In addition to the APIs, there are SDKs written
in all the major programming languages which makes
programmers life easy.
AWS CLOUD FORMATION
Cloud Formation is the next level abstraction of SDK. It provides
you set of tools that you can define your cloud resources
declaratively using YAML or JSON syntax.
HASHICORP TERRAFORM
Terraform is an open-source infrastructure as code software tool
created by HashiCorp. It enables users to define and provision a
datacenter infrastructure using a high-level configuration language
known as Hashicorp Configuration Language
Terraform
Cloud Formation
SDKs
Web APIs

6. AWS HAS STRONG SDK
AWS has released SDKs for almost
all services in multiple languages.
BUT SDK DOESN’T
MAINTAIN THE STATE
When you are working with SDK,
you are responsible for maintaining
the state of the infrastructure
created
CDK TAKES CARE OF THE
STATE
CDK is an extension of Cloud
Formation. It does the entire state
management as CF does
WHY CDK? THERE IS SDK
Reinventing wheel?
AWS CDK
Terraform
Cloud Formation
SDKs
Web APIs
State
State

7. “SERVERLESS APPLICATION
DEVELOPMENT CHALLENGED THE
PRACTICES WE FOLLOWED IN OUR
IAC FRONT”
MORE WORK TO OPS TEAM

8. 1
2
4
5
3
1. Jenkins runs terraform scripts to setup the environment
2. Terraform creates network resources in AWS
3. Serverless configurations files are updated with extracted resources addresses
4. Jenkins trigger serverless deployment scripts
5. Serverless creates application resources in AWS

9. Single IaC framework for both infrastructure and lambda
Developer friendly and less bulky compared to Cloud Formation
No manual work or bridging code required in between
CDK, A SOLUTION

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CDK CONCEPTS
Basically three constructs
APPS
STACKS
CONSTRUCTS
A construct represents a "cloud component" and
encapsulates everything AWS CloudFormation
needs to create the component.
The unit of deployment in the AWS CDK is
called a stack. A root construct which
represents a single CloudFormation stack.
A construct which represents an entire CDK
app. This construct is normally the root of the
construct tree.

11. HAS IT BEEN EVER
USED IN
PRODUCTION?
YES WE DO

12. PIGLET
Budget & Expense Manager Application Suite

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RTO DETAILED
Setting up entire infrastructure from the scratch and deploy full application
ALEXA SKILL
DEPLOYMENT
SETTING UP
INFRASTRUCTURE
E2E REGRESSION
TEST RUN
API DEPLOYMENT PORTAL
DEPLOYMENT
5 MINUTES 2 MINUTES 5 MINUTES
10 MINUTES 10 MINUTES*

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CDK APP
Root of the the entire structure

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MICROSERVICES STACK
This stack deploys all the infrastructure resources related to Piglet APIs
PARENT
STACK PROPS
CONSTRUCTOR
You must instantiate all the construct which you want
to attach with this stack. This is the only public
function interface framework identifies and execute.
Props is the data structure that you use to pass all the
extra details to the stack
Reference of the app should be passed as the parent.

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MICROSERVICE CONSTRUCT
Microservice contains one or more lambda and it associated resources
PARENT
CONSTRUCTOR PROPS
CONSTRUCTOR
You must write all your resource creation code here.
This is the only public function interface framework
identifies and execute.
Props is the data structure that you use to pass all the
extra details to the construct
Reference of the stack should be passed as the
parent.

20. LET’S SEE SOME CODE

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CDK
PROS
AND
CONS
Most of the services are still in
unstable development stage. With
every update, you will get breaking
changes.
Some of the key services still haven’t
released any CDK module. When
you are working on a project where
lots of AWS services are required,
there is a high chance that you must
use hybrid approach.
Incomplete documentation and lack
of examples in the internet.
Several critical bugs still unresolved
for many releases.
CONS
Usage of general-purpose
programming languages makes its
easy to align on programming best
practices that you follow in the
organization as a development team.
Sensible defaults reduces number of
code lines that you must write.
Ability to build reusable libraries
reduced the amount of copy pastes
you did with its predecessor, Cloud
Formation .
PROS

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Q & A
kasundilunika@gmail.com
@dilunika
www.linkedin.com/in/kasundilunika
medium.com/@dilunika
kasun@digitaltransformation.co.nz
@DTL_NZ
www.linkedin.com/company/dtlnz
medium.com/dtlpub