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Understanding AWS SAM(Serverless Application Model)

The AWS Serverless Application Model (SAM) is an open-source framework designed to facilitate the development of serverless applications. It offers a concise syntax for expressing functions, APIs, databases, and event source mappings. By using just a few lines of code for each resource, you can define your desired application and represent it using YAML. During the deployment process, SAM transforms and expands the SAM syntax into AWS CloudFormation syntax, enabling you to build serverless applications more efficiently.
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To begin building SAM-based applications, you can utilize the AWS SAM CLI. This CLI provides an environment similar to Lambda, allowing you to locally build, test, and debug applications defined using SAM templates or the AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK). Additionally, the SAM CLI offers the capability to deploy your applications to AWS. It also supports the creation of secure continuous integration and deployment (CI/CD) pipelines that adhere to best practices and integrate seamlessly with both AWS' native tools and third-party CI/CD systems.

Benefits of SAM:

Single Deployment Configuration
Use SAM to organize related components, share configuration such as memory and timeouts between resources, and deploy all related resources together as a single, versioned entity.

Built on AWS CloudFormation
AWS SAM is an extension of AWS CloudFormation, so you get the reliable deployment capabilities of CloudFormation. You can also define resources using CloudFormation in your SAM template and use the full suite of resources, intrinsic functions, and other template features that are available in AWS CloudFormation.

Local Testing and Debugging
Use SAM CLI to step-through and debug your code. It provides a Lambda-like execution environment locally and helps you catch issues upfront.

Built-In Best Practices
Deploy your infrastructure as config to leverage best practices such as code reviews. Enable gradual deployments through AWS CodeDeploy and tracing using AWS X-Ray with just a few lines of SAM config.

Integration with Development Tools
SAM integrates with a suite of AWS serverless tools. Find new applications in the AWS Serverless Application Repository, use AWS Cloud9 IDE to author, test, and debug SAM-based serverless applications, and AWS CodeBuild, AWS CodeDeploy, and AWS CodePipeline to build a deployment pipeline. To start with a project structure, code repository, and CI/CD pipeline configured for you, try AWS CodeStar.

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