What is the purpose of AWS CloudFormation templates?

The purpose of AWS CloudFormation templates is to define the desired state of infrastructure as code in a collaborative manner. CloudFormation enables users to describe their infrastructure resources in a declarative template format, typically written in YAML or JSON. This allows for the automated provisioning and management of resources, ensuring consistent configuration and compliance across environments.

By defining infrastructure as code, teams can version control their configurations, replicate environments easily, and collaborate effectively on infrastructure management. This reduces the risk of errors that can occur with manual configurations and enhances the ability to deploy environments quickly and reliably.

Utilizing CloudFormation templates also facilitates best practices in infrastructure management, such as reusability and modularity, by allowing the creation of stacks composed of related resources. This approach contributes significantly to maintaining a well-organized and efficient cloud architecture.