Linux kernel source used in Amazon provided Ubuntu AMI?
Few questions regarding ubuntu ami id in AWS missing in Amazon EC2 AMI Locator for ubuntu - Stack Overflow
amazon web services - Get latest AMI ID for AWS instance - Stack Overflow
amazon ec2 - Is there a list of AMIs for every popular linux distribution and version - Stack Overflow
A little-known recent feature is the ability to Query for the latest Amazon Linux AMI IDs using AWS Systems Manager Parameter Store | AWS Compute Blog.
The namespace is made up of two parts:
- Parameter Store Prefix (tree):
/aws/service/ami-amazon-linux-latest/ - AMI name alias: (example) amzn-ami-hvm-x86_64-gp2
These:
aws ec2 describe-images --owners amazon --filters "Name=name,Values=amzn*" --query 'sort_by(Images, &CreationDate)[].Name'
Get-EC2ImageByName -Name amzn* | Sort-Object CreationDate | Select-Object Name
can be changed into:
aws ssm get-parameters --names /aws/service/ami-amazon-linux-latest/amzn2-ami-hvm-x86_64-gp2 --region us-east-1
Get-SSMParameter -Name /aws/service/ami-amazon-linux-latest/amzn2-ami-hvm-x86_64-gp2 -region us-east-1
Plus, it can be used in a CloudFormation template:
# Use public Systems Manager Parameter
Parameters :
LatestAmiId :
Type : 'AWS::SSM::Parameter::Value<AWS::EC2::Image::Id>'
Default: ‘/aws/service/ami-amazon-linux-latest/amzn2-ami-hvm-x86_64-gp2’
Resources :
Instance :
Type : 'AWS::EC2::Instance'
Properties :
ImageId : !Ref LatestAmiId
AWS CLI
A way to filter the output and get the only the required attributes is using a combination of filters,queries on the aws describe-images command as below:
aws ec2 describe-images \
--owners 'amazon' \
--filters 'Name=description,Values=Amazon Linux AMI*' \
--query 'sort_by(Images, &CreationDate)[-1].[ImageId]' \
--output 'text'
Command Explanation:
- owners : For images by amazon, use 'amazon'. To query your own images, use 'self'
- filters : You can use a list of filters to filter out the instance that you are looking for. I prefer description because I found the name filter missing for some images. Values support wildcards. More on filters
- query : Query can be used to filter only what is required from the output. You can also sort on fields that would be present in the output. I have sorted on the images and the creation date to get the last created image and filtered the ImageId
- output : Output can be json or text based on the way you plan to consume it.
Using Python
You can do the same using the below python script:
import boto3
from operator import itemgetter
client = boto3.client('ec2')
response = client.describe_images(
Filters=[
{
'Name': 'description',
'Values': [
'Amazon Linux AMI*',
]
},
],
Owners=[
'amazon'
]
)
# Sort on Creation date Desc
image_details = sorted(response['Images'],key=itemgetter('CreationDate'),reverse=True)
ami_id = image_details[0]['ImageId']
Update:
You can use fine-grain filters to get a quicker response. The filters mentioned in @Jack's answer work.
filters = [ {
'Name': 'name',
'Values': ['amzn-ami-hvm-*']
},{
'Name': 'description',
'Values': ['Amazon Linux AMI*']
},{
'Name': 'architecture',
'Values': ['x86_64']
},{
'Name': 'owner-alias',
'Values': ['amazon']
},{
'Name': 'owner-id',
'Values': ['137112412989']
},{
'Name': 'state',
'Values': ['available']
},{
'Name': 'root-device-type',
'Values': ['ebs']
},{
'Name': 'virtualization-type',
'Values': ['hvm']
},{
'Name': 'hypervisor',
'Values': ['xen']
},{
'Name': 'image-type',
'Values': ['machine']
} ]
# Use above filters
response = client.describe_images(
Filters=filters,
Owners=[
'amazon'
]
)
The success of Ubuntu as a platform and Ubuntu's commitment to refreshing AMIs means that there are literally thousands of of images on Amazon EC2 with "ubuntu"in their name. That, combined with and the lack of Ubuntu on the "Quick Start" menu makes selecting the right AMI a non-trivial task.
Some General Ubuntu Information
You already may be aware of these items, but I want to point them out for those who are just getting started with Ubuntu or EC2.
- Ubuntu releases every 6 months. Each release has a version number and a codename. The most important thing to note here is that every 2 years a LTS (Long Term Support) release is made. If you want stability and support for 5 years, select an LTS release. If you want the newest packages, select the most recent release. See the wikipedia entry for more information.
- At the time of this writing, there are 5 "regions" in Amazon EC2. Each region represents a geographical location. Each region has its own AMI ids. Inside each region there are 2 architectures (x86_64, i386) and 2 "root store" types (EBS or instance). That means that for each build Ubuntu releases, we generate 20 ami ids.
Easiest: Find AMIs From Your Web Browser
You can choose your interface for selecting images. Go to either:
https://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/locator/
At the bottom of this page, you can select the region, release, arch or root-store. You're only shown the most recent releases here. When you've made your selection, you can copy and paste the ami number, or just click on it to go right to the EC2 console launch page for that AMI.
or
- https://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/server/releases/
- Select Your release by number or code-name
- Select 'release/': We keep historical builds around for debugging, but the 'release/' directory will always be the latest.
- Select your AMI from the table and click to launch in the console or copy and paste a command line.
Search through the Amazon EC2 Console
The EC2 Console is a graphical way to sort through AMIs and select one to launch. To Launch an Official Ubuntu Image here, follow the steps below.
Select the region you want in the top left, under 'Navigation' Example: "Us East (Virginia)"
Click "AMIs" Do not click "Launch Instance" [see note below]
for 'Viewing', select "All Images"
Limit the results to Ubuntu Stable Release images by typing ubuntu-images/
You should expand the 'AMI Name' field as wide as possible (maybe shrink the others).
Limit the results to a specific release by appending '.*'.
For example: ubuntu-images/.*10.04
Limit the results to a given arch by appending '.*i386' or '.*amd64'
Note: If you want to run a m1.small or c1.medium, you need 'i386'. If you want to run a t1.micro, you will need to select an 'ebs' image.
Sort your results by AMI Name and make selection
By sorting by AMI name, you can more easily see the newest AMI for a given set. Each AMI ends with a number in the format YYYYMMDD (year,month,day). You want the most recent one.
Verify the Owner is 099720109477!
Any user can register an AMI under any name. Nothing prevents a malicious user from registering an AMI that would match the search above. So, in order to be safe, you need to verify that the owner of the ami is '099720109477'. Ownership verification
If "Owner" is not a column for you, click "Show/Hide" at the top right and select "Owner" to be shown.
Click on the AMI name, then Click 'Launch'
Notes
- Web Console 'Launch Instance' dialog: I saw no way in the 'Launch Instance' dialog to see the Owner ID. Because if this, I suggest not using that dialog to find "Community AMIs". There is simply no way you can reliably know who the owner of the image is from within the console. For advanced users, I will blog sometime soon on a way to find AMIs programmatically [Hint].
Source 1: ubuntu-smoser.blogspot.com
Source 2: ubuntu.com
New and improved version.
# needed as json list returned by ubuntu site is mal-formed
remove_last_comma() { sed '
$x;$G;/\(.*\),/!H;//!{$!d
}; $!x;$s//\1/;s/^\n//'
}
curl -s "https://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/locator/ec2/releasesTable" \
| remove_last_comma \
| jq -c '.aaData[] | select(contains(["16.04", "us-west-2", "hvm:ebs"]))' \
| grep -o 'ami-[a-z0-9]\+' | head -1
Basically grabs raw data used for ubuntu's ami finding page, and uses jq to parse out the row I want then a grep to pull out the value. Much faster than the old version.
-- original version
Here's another example. I just wrote this to fetch the latest trusty AMI id. It uses the aws cli tool to query the API, using the fact that the names sort in date order to get the latest.
name=$(\
aws --region us-west-2 ec2 describe-images --owners 099720109477 \
--filters Name=root-device-type,Values=ebs \
Name=architecture,Values=x86_64 \
Name=name,Values='*hvm-ssd/ubuntu-trusty-14.04*' \
| awk -F ': ' '/"Name"/ { print $2 | "sort" }' \
| tr -d '",' | tail -1)
ami_id=$(\
aws --region us-west-2 ec2 describe-images --owners 099720109477 \
--filters Name=name,Values="$name" \
| awk -F ': ' '/"ImageId"/ { print $2 }' | tr -d '",')
It works in 2 parts. The first part gets all the AMIs for ubuntu trusty that meet the various criterion (ebs, x86_64, and the name pattern). It pulls out the Name and sorts by it. The names are formatted so that sorting them sorts by date so the last one will be the newest one. This name is then assigned to the 'name' variable.
The second part uses that name to request the AMI ID for the AMI with that name. It parses out just the id and assigns it to 'ami_id'.
Amazon provides a list on their website. https://aws.amazon.com/amis
Actually I was sure that it was also possible to grab and filter the list via the API but unfortunately I can't find any documentation about this (imaginary?) feature
You can get AMI ID from aws site
Below is how to
To find a Linux AMI using the Images page
Open the Amazon EC2 console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/ec2/.
From the navigation bar, select a region. You can select any region that's available to you, regardless of your location. This is the region in which you'll launch your instance.
In the navigation pane, choose AMIs.
(Optional) Use the Filter options to scope the list of displayed AMIs to see only the AMIs that interest you. For example, to list all Linux AMIs provided by AWS, select Public images. Choose the Search bar and select Owner from the menu, then select Amazon images. Choose the Search bar again to select Platform and then the operating system from the list provided.
(Optional) Choose the Show/Hide Columns icon to select which image attributes to display, such as the root device type. Alternatively, you can select an AMI from the list and view its properties in the Details tab.
The AMI ID for the platform and Distribution you have chosen would be in the AMI ID tab
More detail here: http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/finding-an-ami.html
I want to use the Amazon Linux 2 as my AMI ID, but I can't hard code it else the cloudformation will be region bound. But I can't find the information for where the AMI ids for each region is?