Describe Components

Describing components helps understand the final, fully deep-merged configuration for an Atmos component in each stack.

The more DRY a configuration is due to imports, the more derived the configuration is due to inheritance, the harder it may be to understand what the final component configuration will be.

For example, if we wanted to understand what the final configuration looks like for a "vpc" component running in the "production" stack in the us-east-2 AWS region, we could do that by calling the atmos describe component command and view the YAML output:

atmos describe component vpc -s ue2-prod

For more powerful filtering options, consider describing stacks instead.

The other helpful use-case for describing components and stacks is when developing policies for validation of Atmos components and Atmos stacks. OPA policies can enforce what is or is not permitted. Everything in the output can be validated using policies that you develop.

Want to go deeper on this topic?

For a deep dive into describing components, refer to the CLI command reference. Command Reference