atmos-stores

Atmos External Stores

Stores are external key-value backends configured in atmos.yaml that enable components to share data outside of Terraform state. Atmos supports store providers including AWS SSM Parameter Store, AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, Google Secret Manager, Redis, and JFrog Artifactory.

When to Use Stores

Use stores when you need to:

• Share data between components that is not managed by Terraform
• Access configuration from external systems (SSM, Azure Key Vault, Redis)
• Integrate with CI/CD pipelines that write to parameter stores
• Store and retrieve Terraform outputs via hooks for faster cross-component reads
• Share state across accounts, regions, or cloud providers

For Terraform-managed outputs, prefer !terraform.state (fastest) or !terraform.output. Use stores for external data or when you need a write-back mechanism via hooks.

Configuring Stores in atmos.yaml

All stores are declared under the top-level stores: key in atmos.yaml. Each store has a unique name, a kind, and provider-specific options. The legacy type field remains supported for compatibility, but kind is canonical:

# atmos.yaml
stores:
  prod/ssm:
    kind: aws/ssm
    options:
      region: us-east-1

  prod/asm:
    kind: aws/asm
    options:
      region: us-east-1

  prod/azure:
    kind: azure/keyvault
    options:
      vault_url: "https://my-keyvault.vault.azure.net/"

  prod/gcp:
    kind: gcp/secretmanager
    options:
      project_id: my-project

  cache:
    type: redis
    options:
      url: "redis://localhost:6379"

  artifacts:
    type: artifactory
    options:
      url: https://artifactory.example.com
      repo_name: my-repo

Store Naming Convention

Store names follow the pattern <environment>/<type> by convention:

• prod/ssm -- Production SSM Parameter Store
• dev/secrets -- Development secrets
• shared/config -- Shared configuration store

These names are referenced in !store function calls and hook configurations.