Providing AWS credentials - AWS Toolkit for Visual Studio
Credentials locationsOptions for configuring credentials

Providing AWS credentials

Before you can use the Toolkit for Visual Studio, you must provide one or more sets of valid AWS credentials. These credentials allow you to access your AWS resources through the Toolkit for Visual Studio. They're also used to sign programmatic web services requests so that AWS can verify that the request comes from an authorized source.

Important

AWS credentials consist of an access key ID and secret access key. We recommend that you do NOT use your account's root credentials. Instead, create one or more IAM users, and then use those credentials. For additional information, see Using IAM Users and Best Practices for Managing AWS Access Keys.

Credentials locations

The Toolkit for Visual Studio supports multiple sets of credentials from any number of AWS accounts. Each credentials set is referred to as a profile. The Toolkit for Visual Studio works with profiles stored in the following locations:

  • Shared AWS files: By default, these files are located in the .aws directory in your home directory and are named config and credentials. (The location of your home directory varies based on the operating system, but is referred to using the environment variables %UserProfile% in Windows and $HOME or ~ (tilde) in Unix-based systems.)

    Credentials stored in these files are in plaintext, and are accessible by the AWS CLI and the AWS SDKs.

    For more information, see Where Are Configuration Settings Stored? in the AWS Command Line Interface User Guide.

  • SDK Store: On Windows systems, the SDK Store is another place to create profiles and store encrypted credentials for your AWS for .NET applications. It's located in %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\AWSToolkit\RegisteredAccounts.json. You can use the SDK Store during development as an alternative to the shared AWS credentials file.

    Credentials stored here are encrypted on your machine, and are specific to your Windows user account. They can't be decrypted or used elsewhere.

    For more information, see Configuring AWS credentials in the AWS SDK for .NET Developer Guide.

Options for configuring credentials

To work with AWS services using the Toolkit for Visual Studio, you need to configure at least one credential profile that's available in either the shared AWS credentials file or the SDK Store.

For options for obtaining the necessary access keys and adding them to a profile that's stored in either a shared AWS credentials file or SDK Store, see Creating profiles for your AWS credentials. And you can enhance your access credentials by adding entries to profiles that define how to use AWS Single Sign-On (IAM Identity Center) and multi-factor authentication (MFA).

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