AWS Command Line Interface - Configure command

My learning of the AWS Command Line Interface is a work in progress at best. Along the way, I have found you can configure default settings including security credentials and the region so that when commands are executed they are done so within the context of your configuration. You can override the configuration by using command line options or by setting environment variables. (A list of supported environment variables can be found here.)

Note: My primary workstation OS is Windows 10.

After typing the command: aws configure <Enter> you are prompted for four items:

• AWS Access Key ID
• AWS Secret Access Key
• Default region name
• Default output format

You can get the access key and secret from the IAM console.
You can pick a default region from the AWS Regions and Endpoint list.
You can pick [json, text, or table] as the output format. If left blank, the default is json

After running the command, two files

• config
• credentials

are created in the C:\Users\[Your Windows User]\.aws

I seem to always forget where those files are located. A quick way to view the contents at the command line is: c:\dir "%UserProfile%\.aws" I have also found that if you mess up the configuration, you can delete the config and credential files and basically start over.