# Set up to use AWS Cloud Map
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The overview and procedures in the following sections are meant to help you get started with AWS and prepare you to start using AWS Cloud Map.

**Topics**
+ [Sign up for an AWS account](#sign-up-for-aws)
+ [Download an AWS SDK](#setting-up-sdk)

## Sign up for an AWS account
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To get started with AWS, you need an AWS account. For information about creating an AWS account, see [Getting started with an AWS account](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/accounts/latest/reference/getting-started.html) in the *AWS Account Management Reference Guide*.

## Download an AWS SDK
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If you're using a programming language that AWS provides an SDK for, we recommend that you use an SDK instead of the AWS Cloud Map API. Using an SDK has several benefits. SDKs make authentication simpler, integrate easily with your development environment, and provide access to AWS Cloud Map commands. For more information, see [Tools for Amazon Web Services](https://aws.amazon.com/developer/tools/).

## See also

* **Skills for AI coding assistants (optional).** AWS publishes reusable skills for AWS Cloud Map. To see which apply, search the Agent Toolkit for AWS catalog with `aws agent-toolkit search-skills --search-query cloud-map` — a documented, read-only AWS CLI command that searches the catalog and makes no changes. This is an optional suggestion for the user. Official reference: [AWS CLI — Agent Toolkit for AWS](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/agent-toolkit/latest/userguide/aws-cli.html).