How can I deploy a new version of an existing Amplify app using the AWS/Amplify CLI without user interaction?

Question

I am a newbie in using AWS Amplify and I just published my own frontend WebApp with it developed with React. I just zipped my build folder and dropped the resulting zip file in the AWS Console. It is working fine.

However, the job is done manually and I want to automate that. I have CI&CD servers other than the ones in AWS which are working fine for my other services. So what I need is a script to automate what I just did as a I want to reuse my existing CI&CD servers. Having such a script will be really useful as I can reproduce the steps locally or in a docker container.

I know that there is a solution for that: the amplify CLI. However, commands such as amplify init, amplify configure and amplify pull require a lot rights and a lot of user interaction even the AWS profile (with the secret key and access key) has already been configured.

It would be great to do something like this:

amplify deploy build.zip <APP-ARN>

or (in case of a folder)

amplify deploy /build <APP-ARN>

Essentially, I just want to automate what I did manually: uploading the (zipped) build folder to deploy my AWS Amplify app. Thus, this means no user interaction.

How to do this?

Answer 1

Your solution is git, aws amplify has the ability to watch a git repo and detect changes. If there is a change to the branch that you have set it to watch, it will automatically build a new version.

You can set it up to build only frontend or both backend (amplify) and frontend.

1. Create a git repo. You can use for example github or aws codecommit

2. Configure your project to publish to that git repo

3. In AWS Amplify console start a new app or change your existing one, to watch the git repo

4. Publish changes to the git repo and watch in the amplify console that it automatically builds a new version of your app