Hands-On: Testing and Setting up SSM Parameters

All preparations are now done, so we can start setting up the SSM parameter store. First, let’s test if the new launch template works as expected and if all permissions are set correctly. Next, we’ll set up all the necessary parameters.

Create a test parameter

Let’s create a test parameter that we can read from within our WordPress instance to test that everything works.

To do so, we’ll use the ssm put-parameter command to create a new SSM parameter store parameter.

The command takes the following parameters:

• --name to specify the name of the parameter. The SSM parameter store stores parameters in a folder-like structure, so all parameter names need to start with a slash (/). Just like folders, we can create a directory tree. We can use /wordpress/test as our first parameter name.
• --value to specify the value of the parameter. Let’s be very creative and put in testvalue.
• --type to specify which kind of parameter we want to create. SSM parameter store supports three types: String, StringList, and SecureString.

These are all the parameters we need, so the full command looks like this: