The Orchestration module enables you to orchestrate multiple composite cloud applications. This module supports use of both the Amazon Web Services (AWS) CloudFormation template format through both a Query API that is compatible with CloudFormation and the native OpenStack Heat Orchestration Template (HOT) format through a REST API. These flexible template languages enable application developers to describe and automate the deployment of infrastructure, services, and applications. The templates enable creation of most OpenStack resource types, such as instances, floating IP addresses, volumes, security groups, and users. The resources, once created, are referred to as stacks. The template languages are described in the Template Guide in the Heat developer documentation.

To create a stack, or template, from an example template file, run the following command: $ heat stack-create mystack --template-file /PATH_TO_HEAT_TEMPLATES/WordPress_Single_Instance.template --parameters "InstanceType=m1.large;DBUsername=USERNAME;DBPassword=PASSWORD;KeyName=HEAT_KEY;LinuxDistribution=F17" The --parameters values that you specify depend on the parameters that are defined in the template. If a website hosts the template file, you can specify the URL with the --template-url parameter instead of the --template-file parameter. The command returns the following output: +--------------------------------------+---------------+--------------------+----------------------+ | id | stack_name | stack_status | creation_time | +--------------------------------------+---------------+--------------------+----------------------+ | 4c712026-dcd5-4664-90b8-0915494c1332 | mystack | CREATE_IN_PROGRESS | 2013-04-03T23:22:08Z | +--------------------------------------+---------------+--------------------+----------------------+ You can also use the template-validate command to validate a template file without creating a stack from it. Previous versions of the heat client used validate instead of template-validate, but it has been deprecated in favor of template-validate. To do so, run the following command: $ heat template-validate --template-file /PATH_TO_HEAT_TEMPLATES/WordPress_Single_Instance.template If validation fails, the response returns an error message.

To explore the state and history of a particular stack, you can run a number of commands. To see which stacks are visible to the current user, run the following command: $ heat stack-list +--------------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | id | stack_name | stack_status | creation_time | +--------------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | 4c712026-dcd5-4664-90b8-0915494c1332 | mystack | CREATE_COMPLETE | 2013-04-03T23:22:08Z | | 7edc7480-bda5-4e1c-9d5d-f567d3b6a050 | my-otherstack | CREATE_FAILED | 2013-04-03T23:28:20Z | +--------------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+----------------------+ To show the details of a stack, run the following command: $ heat stack-show mystack A stack consists of a collection of resources. To list the resources and their status, run the following command: $ heat resource-list mystack +---------------------+--------------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | logical_resource_id | resource_type | resource_status | updated_time | +---------------------+--------------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | WikiDatabase | AWS::EC2::Instance | CREATE_COMPLETE | 2013-04-03T23:25:56Z | +---------------------+--------------------+-----------------+----------------------+ To show the details for a specific resource in a stack, run the following command: $ heat resource-show mystack WikiDatabase Some resources have associated metadata which can change throughout the life cycle of a resource. Show the metadata by running the following command: $ heat resource-metadata mystack WikiDatabase A series of events is generated during the life cycle of a stack. To display life cycle events, run the following command:: $ heat event-list mystack +---------------------+----+------------------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | logical_resource_id | id | resource_status_reason | resource_status | event_time | +---------------------+----+------------------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | WikiDatabase | 1 | state changed | IN_PROGRESS | 2013-04-03T23:22:09Z | | WikiDatabase | 2 | state changed | CREATE_COMPLETE | 2013-04-03T23:25:56Z | +---------------------+----+------------------------+-----------------+----------------------+ To show the details for a particular event, run the following command: $ heat event-show WikiDatabase 1

To update an existing stack from a modified template file, run a command like the following command: $ heat stack-update mystack --template-file /path/to/heat/templates/WordPress_Single_Instance_v2.template --parameters "InstanceType=m1.large;DBUsername=wp;DBPassword=verybadpassword;KeyName=heat_key;LinuxDistribution=F17" +--------------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | id | stack_name | stack_status | creation_time | +--------------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+----------------------+ | 4c712026-dcd5-4664-90b8-0915494c1332 | mystack | UPDATE_COMPLETE | 2013-04-03T23:22:08Z | | 7edc7480-bda5-4e1c-9d5d-f567d3b6a050 | my-otherstack | CREATE_FAILED | 2013-04-03T23:28:20Z | +--------------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+----------------------+ Some resources are updated in-place, while others are replaced with new resources.