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  1. Stackups
  2. DevOps
  3. Build Automation
  4. Infrastructure Build Tools
  5. AWS Cloud Development Kit vs GoFormation

AWS Cloud Development Kit vs GoFormation

OverviewComparisonAlternatives

Overview

GoFormation
GoFormation
Stacks3
Followers7
Votes0
GitHub Stars849
Forks199
AWS Cloud Development Kit
AWS Cloud Development Kit
Stacks208
Followers102
Votes0
GitHub Stars12.5K
Forks4.3K

AWS Cloud Development Kit vs GoFormation: What are the differences?

Comparison between AWS Cloud Development Kit and GoFormation

  1. Programming Language Support: The key difference between AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK) and GoFormation is the programming language support they offer. CDK supports multiple programming languages such as TypeScript, Python, Java, and C#, while GoFormation specifically focuses on Go language only. This difference in language support can influence developers' preferences based on their language proficiency and comfort.

  2. Abstraction Level: Another notable difference is the abstraction level provided by AWS CDK and GoFormation. CDK offers a higher level of abstraction, allowing developers to define infrastructure using object-oriented programming constructs and leveraging cloud-specific best practices. In contrast, GoFormation offers a more granular level of control, requiring developers to directly define and manage CloudFormation templates in Go code.

  3. Community and Ecosystem: The community and ecosystem surrounding AWS CDK are more expansive compared to GoFormation. Due to its multi-language support and official backing from AWS, CDK has a larger community of contributors, libraries, and resources available. This broader ecosystem can provide developers using CDK with more support, documentation, and potential solutions to their infrastructure challenges.

  4. Maturity and Stability: AWS CDK has been in development longer than GoFormation, leading to a higher level of maturity and stability. CDK has undergone more iterations, updates, and improvements, which can result in a more robust and reliable infrastructure-as-code solution. On the other hand, GoFormation, being a newer project, may still be evolving and refining its features and capabilities.

  5. Learning Curve: The learning curve associated with AWS CDK and GoFormation differs based on their approach to defining infrastructure. CDK's higher-level constructs and abstractions may make it easier for developers familiar with object-oriented programming to get started quickly. In contrast, GoFormation's lower-level control and direct manipulation of CloudFormation resources may require a deeper understanding of CloudFormation concepts and Go programming.

  6. Vendor Lock-in Concerns: One consideration for choosing between AWS CDK and GoFormation is vendor lock-in concerns. CDK, being an AWS-specific tool, may tie the infrastructure code more closely to AWS services and features. In comparison, GoFormation's focus on generating CloudFormation templates in Go code may offer developers more flexibility and portability across cloud providers. This difference can influence decisions based on long-term scalability and vendor-independent solutions.

In Summary, AWS CDK and GoFormation differ in programming language support, abstraction level, community and ecosystem, maturity and stability, learning curve, and vendor lock-in concerns, offering developers a range of features and considerations to evaluate for their infrastructure-as-code needs.

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Detailed Comparison

GoFormation
GoFormation
AWS Cloud Development Kit
AWS Cloud Development Kit

GoFormation is a Go library for working with AWS CloudFormation / AWS Serverless Application Model (SAM) templates.

It is an open source software development framework to model and provision your cloud application resources using familiar programming languages. It uses the familiarity and expressive power of programming languages for modeling your applications. It provides you with high-level components that preconfigure cloud resources with proven defaults, so you can build cloud applications without needing to be an expert.

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Easier cloud onboarding; Faster development process; Customizable and shareable; No context switching
Statistics
GitHub Stars
849
GitHub Stars
12.5K
GitHub Forks
199
GitHub Forks
4.3K
Stacks
3
Stacks
208
Followers
7
Followers
102
Votes
0
Votes
0
Integrations
AWS CloudFormation
AWS CloudFormation
Amazon EC2
Amazon EC2
Golang
Golang
C#
C#
JavaScript
JavaScript
Visual Studio Code
Visual Studio Code
Java
Java
Python
Python
TypeScript
TypeScript
.NET
.NET
AWS CloudFormation
AWS CloudFormation

What are some alternatives to GoFormation, AWS Cloud Development Kit?

AWS CloudFormation

AWS CloudFormation

You can use AWS CloudFormation’s sample templates or create your own templates to describe the AWS resources, and any associated dependencies or runtime parameters, required to run your application. You don’t need to figure out the order in which AWS services need to be provisioned or the subtleties of how to make those dependencies work.

Packer

Packer

Packer automates the creation of any type of machine image. It embraces modern configuration management by encouraging you to use automated scripts to install and configure the software within your Packer-made images.

Scalr

Scalr

Scalr is a remote state & operations backend for Terraform with access controls, policy as code, and many quality of life features.

Pulumi

Pulumi

Pulumi is a cloud development platform that makes creating cloud programs easy and productive. Skip the YAML and just write code. Pulumi is multi-language, multi-cloud and fully extensible in both its engine and ecosystem of packages.

Azure Resource Manager

Azure Resource Manager

It is the deployment and management service for Azure. It provides a management layer that enables you to create, update, and delete resources in your Azure subscription. You use management features, like access control, locks, and tags, to secure and organize your resources after deployment.

Habitat

Habitat

Habitat is a new approach to automation that focuses on the application instead of the infrastructure it runs on. With Habitat, the apps you build, deploy, and manage behave consistently in any runtime — metal, VMs, containers, and PaaS. You'll spend less time on the environment and more time building features.

Google Cloud Deployment Manager

Google Cloud Deployment Manager

Google Cloud Deployment Manager allows you to specify all the resources needed for your application in a declarative format using yaml.

Yocto

Yocto

It is an open source collaboration project that helps developers create custom Linux-based systems regardless of the hardware architecture. It provides a flexible set of tools and a space where embedded developers worldwide can share technologies, software stacks, configurations, and best practices that can be used to create tailored Linux images for embedded and IOT devices, or anywhere a customized Linux OS is needed.

GeoEngineer

GeoEngineer

GeoEngineer uses Terraform to plan and execute changes, so the DSL to describe resources is similar to Terraform's. GeoEngineer's DSL also provides programming and object oriented features like inheritance, abstraction, branching and looping.

Atlas

Atlas

Atlas is one foundation to manage and provide visibility to your servers, containers, VMs, configuration management, service discovery, and additional operations services.

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