Troubleshoot the processed template - AWS CloudFormation (original) (raw)

When using a macro, the processed template can be found in the CloudFormation console.

The stage of a template indicates its processing status:

• Original: The template that the user originally submitted to create or update the stack or stack set.
• Processed: The template CloudFormation used to create or update the stack or stack set after processing any referenced macros. The processed template is formatted as JSON, even if the original template was formatted as YAML.

For troubleshooting, use the processed template. If a template doesn't reference macros, the original and processed templates are identical.

For more information, see View stack information from the CloudFormation console.

To use the AWS CLI to get the processed template, use the get-template command.

Size limitation

The maximum size for a processed stack template is 51,200 bytes when passed directly into a CreateStack, UpdateStack, orValidateTemplate request, or 1 MB when passed as an S3 object using an Amazon S3 template URL. However, during processing CloudFormation updates the temporary state of the template as it serially processes the macros contained in the template. Because of this, the size of the template during processing may temporarily exceed the allowed size of a fully-processed template. CloudFormation allows some buffer for these in-process templates. However, you should design your templates and macros keeping in mind the maximum allowed size for a processed stack template.

If CloudFormation returns a Transformation data limit exceeded error while processing your template, your template has exceeded the maximum template size CloudFormation allows during processing.

To resolve this issue, consider doing the following:

• Restructure your template into multiple templates to avoid exceeding the maximum size for in-process templates. For example:
  • Use nested stack templates to encapsulate parts of the template. For more information, see Embed stacks within other stacks using nested stacks.
  • Create multiple stacks and use cross-stack references to exchange information between them. For more information, see Refer to resource outputs in another CloudFormation stack.
• Reduce the size of template fragment returned by a given macro. CloudFormation doesn't tamper with the contents of fragments returned by macros.