AWS SAM Bootstrap Skill Guide

Overview

The AWS SAM Bootstrap skill helps initialize and migrate serverless projects using AWS Serverless Application Model (SAM). It supports both greenfield projects and existing Lambda/CloudFormation codebases, and standardizes template.yaml, samconfig.toml, and local test event artifacts.

Skill Details

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when you need to:

• Configure AWS SAM for an existing Lambda or CloudFormation project
• Create a new SAM project with production-ready defaults
• Generate or update template.yaml and samconfig.toml
• Add local test payloads in events/ for sam local invoke
• Standardize build/package/deploy workflow for sam deploy
• Migrate existing Lambda functions to SAM templates

Trigger Phrases

• "Configure AWS SAM for this project"
• "Create a new SAM project"
• "Add template.yaml for SAM"
• "Initialize SAM for existing Lambda function"
• "Generate samconfig.toml"
• "Migrate Lambda to SAM"
• "Bootstrap serverless project"

Core Capabilities

1) New Project Bootstrap

• Guide usage of sam init with runtime and package type selection
• Set baseline build/deploy parameters in samconfig.toml
• Add sample local invocation events

2) Existing Project Migration

• Analyze current handler/runtime/dependency layout
• Map existing Lambda resources into SAM templates
• Preserve deployment-critical settings (timeout, memory, environment, triggers)

3) Required Artifacts

The skill ensures these files exist:

.
├── template.yaml
├── samconfig.toml
└── events/
    └── event.json

4) SAM Command Coverage

Default samconfig.toml Pattern

version = 0.1

[default.global.parameters]
stack_name = "my-sam-app"

[default.build.parameters]
cached = true
parallel = true

[default.deploy.parameters]
capabilities = "CAPABILITY_IAM"
confirm_changeset = true
resolve_s3 = true

[prod.deploy.parameters]
confirm_changeset = false

Recommended Workflow

1. Identify scenario: new project or migration
2. Select runtime: Choose non-deprecated runtimes (Zip or Image package type)
3. Generate/update template.yaml: Define Lambda functions and related resources
4. Generate/update samconfig.toml: Configure deploy parameters
5. Add events/event.json: Create test payloads for local invocation
6. Validate: Run sam validate
7. Build: Run sam build
8. Test locally: Run sam local invoke
9. Deploy: Run sam deploy --guided

Validation Checklist

Before deploying, verify:

• sam validate succeeds without errors
• sam build completes successfully
• template.yaml has correct logical IDs and handlers
• samconfig.toml contains deploy parameters for target environments
• IAM capabilities are correctly configured
• Test events are valid JSON

Reference Materials

The skill includes comprehensive reference guides:

• references/examples.md - Complete SAM template examples
• references/migration-checklist.md - Step-by-step migration guide

Related Skills

• AWS CloudFormation Lambda (aws-cloudformation-lambda) - Lambda infrastructure patterns in CloudFormation
• AWS CLI Beast Mode (aws-cli-beast) - Advanced AWS CLI operational workflows
• AWS Cost Optimization (aws-cost-optimization) - Cost controls for serverless workloads