AWS EC2 Image Builder
Create and manage safe pictures with the EC2 Image Builder
Building and testing macOS images is now possible with EC2 Image Builder. In addition to the current support for Windows and Linux, this new feature lets you generate and maintain machine images for your macOS workloads.
What is EC2 Image Builder?
Making unique Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) for your Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances is simple with EC2 Image Builder, a fully managed service. By automating the process of creating and configuring AMIs, you can devote more time to your applications and less time to maintaining your infrastructure.
Building, testing, and deploying virtual machine and container images for on-premises or AWS use is made easier with EC2 Image Builder.
Maintaining current virtual machine and container images can be laborious, resource-intensive, and prone to mistakes. Customers currently either have teams who create automated programs to maintain images or manually update and snapshot virtual machines.
Image Builder’s straightforward graphical user interface, integrated automation, and AWS-provided security settings greatly minimize the work required to maintain secure and current images. You don’t need to create your own automation pipeline or follow manual processes to update an image when using Image Builder.
Aside from the price of the underlying AWS resources needed to produce, store, and distribute the images, Image Builder is provided without charge.
Advantages
Enhanced efficiency in IT
Image Builder’s straightforward graphical user interface, integrated automation, and AWS-provided security settings greatly minimize the work required to maintain virtual machine and container images current and safe. You don’t need to create your own automation pipeline or follow manual processes to update an image when using Image Builder. IT time and resources are saved by not having to write and maintain automation code.
Integrated validation assistance
Before utilizing your pictures in production, you can quickly verify their functionality, compatibility, and security compliance using both your own and AWS-provided tests with EC2 Image Builder. By doing this, errors in photographs that are typically the result of inadequate testing are decreased. It is possible to make the deployment of images into production environments contingent on the successful completion of tests.
Easier to protect
By allowing you to generate images with just the necessary elements, EC2 Image Builder lowers your vulnerability to security flaws. Image Builder has the ability to automatically patch your images when a security patch becomes available. To satisfy relevant internal compliance requirements, you can also apply custom security policies to your images or AWS-provided security policies (such firewall activation, complete disk encryption, and strict password enforcement, among others).
Enforcement of policies centrally
Version control is made possible via EC2 Image Builder, making revision management simple. Automation scripts, recipes, and photos can be shared between AWS accounts thanks to its integrations with AWS Resource Access Manager, AWS Organizations, and Amazon ECR. Information security and IT professionals may more effectively enforce policies and image compliance thanks to security and compliance testing.
Regularly build and test Virtual Machine and container images
Using standard workflows, EC2 Image Builder offers a one-stop shop for creating, securing, and testing current virtual machine and container images.
How it operates
An all-in-one solution for automating image management procedures is Image Builder. Customers can create compliant Linux and Windows Server images for usage on AWS and on-premises by using an easy-to-use wizard in the AWS dashboard to establish an automated pipeline. Following tests, Image Builder automatically creates a new image and distributes it to designated AWS regions whenever software upgrades become available.
EC2 Image Builder example
Here are some examples of customized software that has been applied to the image:
1. Applications (databases, corporate productivity tools, and build environments)
2. Updates for the OS
3. Patches for security.
Examples of protected images using custom templates or those offered by AWS include:
1. Verify that security updates are installed
2. Implement secure passwords
3. Enable whole disk encryption
4. Shut off any open ports that are not necessary
5. Turn on the firewall software
6. Turn on audit and logging controls
Examples of test images using either your own test or the test that AWS provides are as follows:
1. Verify that AMI can start up.
2. Verify that the sample application is operational.
3. A patch specific to the test has been implemented.
4. Examine the security policies.
Amazon EC2 Image Builder now builds and tests macOS images
A bootable disk image, also known as an Amazon Machine Image (AMI), that comes pre-installed with the operating system and all the tools you need for your workload is known as a “golden image.” Your golden image most likely includes the particular operating system version (macOS) and the necessary development tools and libraries to create and test your applications (Xcode, Fastlane, etc.) in the framework of a continuous integration and continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipeline.
Creating and maintaining pipelines by hand to create macOS golden pictures takes a lot of time and takes skilled workers away from other projects. Additionally, using separate tools to create macOS images when you have pipelines in place to make Linux or Windows images results in a fragmented workflow.
Many of you have been requesting the option to use EC2 Image Builder to manage your macOS images because of these factors. Consolidating your image pipelines across operating systems and utilizing EC2 Image Builder’s automation and cloud-based connectors are your goals.
You can now simplify your image management procedures and lower the operational overhead of maintaining macOS images by integrating macOS support into EC2 Image Builder. You may avoid the expenses of maintaining your preferred macOS versions by using EC2 Image Builder to test, version, and validate the basic images at scale.
Cost and accessibility
Not all Mac instance types are available in every region, but EC2 Image Builder for macOS is now available in all of the following: Asia Pacific (Mumbai, Seoul, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo), Europe (Frankfurt, Ireland, London, Stockholm), US East (Ohio, N. Virginia), and US West (Oregon).
EC2 Image Builder Pricing
It is free of charge, and you are only billed for the resources used during pipeline execution that is, the minimum 24-hour period during which your EC2 Mac Dedicated Host is allocated.
With EC2 Image Builder’s preview of macOS support, you can automate your golden image creation processes, combine existing image pipelines, and take advantage of AWS’s cloud-focused connections. With the addition of more instance types to the EC2 Mac platform, this new feature establishes EC2 Image Builder as a complete image management solution for Windows, Linux, and macOS.