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CLI interface illustration:

$  ec2-run-instances ami-b232d0db
RESERVATION     r-f071fe9b      393287865111    default
INSTANCE        i-93b17ef9      ami-b232d0db                    pending	default 0               m1.small      2010-07-11T21:10:12+0000 us-east-1d	aki-94c527fd    ari-96c527ff            monitoring-disabled           ebs
$ ec2-describe-instances i-93b17ef9                       
RESERVATION     r-f071fe9b      393287865111	default 
INSTANCE        i-93b17ef9      ami-b232d0db	ec2-184-73-0-58.compute-1.amazonaws.com	domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42.compute-1.internal      running default 0	m1.small        2010-07-11T21:10:12+0000        us-east-1d	aki-94c527fd    ari-96c527ff            monitoring-disabled	184.73.0.58     10.214.25.172         ebs
BLOCKDEVICE     /dev/sda1       vol-58f39031    2010-07-11T21:10:24.000Z
$ ec2-get-console-output i-93b17ef9
i-93b17ef9
2010-07-11T21:13:35+0000
Linux version 2.6.21.7-2.ec2.v1.2.fc8xen (root@domU-12-31-39-0A-38-01)
(gcc version 4.1.2 20070925 (Red Hat 4.1.2-33)) #1 SMP Fri Nov 20 19:22:36 EST 2009
BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
sanitize start
sanitize bail 0
copy_e820_map() start: 0000000000000000 size: 000000006ac00000 end:
000000006ac00000 type: 1
 Xen: 0000000000000000 - 000000006ac00000 (usable)
980MB HIGHMEM available.
727MB LOWMEM available.
NX (Execute Disable) protection: active
Zone PFN ranges:
  DMA             0 ->   186366
  Normal     186366 ->   186366
  HighMem    186366 ->   437248
early_node_map[1] active PFN ranges
    0:        0 ->   437248
ACPI in unprivileged domain disabled
Detected 2666.783 MHz processor.
Built 1 zonelists.  Total pages: 433833
Kernel command line:  root=/dev/sda1 ro 4
Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.
Initializing CPU#0
CPU 0 irqstacks, hard=c136c000 soft=c134c000
PID hash table entries: 4096 (order: 12, 16384 bytes)
Xen reported: 2666.760 MHz processor.
Console: colour dummy device 80x25
Dentry cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
Inode-cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)
Software IO TLB disabled
vmalloc area: ee000000-f4ffe000, maxmem 2d7fe000
Memory: 1710764k/1748992k available (2072k kernel code, 28936k reserved,
1079k data, 188k init, 1003528k highmem)
virtual kernel memory layout:
    fixmap  : 0xf5315000 - 0xf57fe000   (5028 kB)
    pkmap   : 0xf5000000 - 0xf5200000   (2048 kB)
    vmalloc : 0xee000000 - 0xf4ffe000   ( 111 MB)
    lowmem  : 0xc0000000 - 0xed7fe000   ( 727 MB)
      .init : 0xc1319000 - 0xc1348000   ( 188 kB)
      .data : 0xc120608e - 0xc1313fd4   (1079 kB)
      .text : 0xc1000000 - 0xc120608e   (2072 kB)
Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok.
Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 6669.24 BogoMIPS (lpj=13338490)
Security Framework v1.0.0 initialized
SELinux:  Initializing.
selinux_register_security:  Registering secondary module capability
Capability LSM initialized as secondary
Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
CPU: L1 I cache: 32K, L1 D cache: 32K
CPU: L2 cache: 6144K
Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
SMP alternatives: switching to UP code
Freeing SMP alternatives: 13k freed
Brought up 1 CPUs
NET: Registered protocol family 16
Brought up 1 CPUs
PCI: Fatal: No config space access function found
PCI: setting up Xen PCI frontend stub
Setting up standard PCI resources
ACPI: Interpreter disabled.
Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay
pnp: PnP ACPI: disabled
xen_mem: Initialising balloon driver.
usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
usbcore: registered new device driver usb
PCI: System does not support PCI
PCI: System does not support PCI
NetLabel: Initializing
NetLabel:  domain hash size = 128
NetLabel:  protocols = UNLABELED CIPSOv4
NetLabel:  unlabeled traffic allowed by default
NET: Registered protocol family 2
IP route cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
TCP established hash table entries: 131072 (order: 8, 1572864 bytes)
TCP bind hash table entries: 65536 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 131072 bind 65536)
TCP reno registered
checking if image is initramfs... it is
Freeing initrd memory: 7075k freed
audit: initializing netlink socket (disabled)
audit(1278882632.665:1): initialized
highmem bounce pool size: 64 pages
VFS: Disk quotas dquot_6.5.1
Dquot-cache hash table entries: 1024 (order 0, 4096 bytes)
ksign: Installing public key data
Loading keyring
io scheduler noop registered
io scheduler anticipatory registered
io scheduler deadline registered
io scheduler cfq registered (default)
pci_hotplug: PCI Hot Plug PCI Core version: 0.5
rtc: IRQ 8 is not free.
Non-volatile memory driver v1.2
Linux agpgart interface v0.102 (c) Dave Jones
RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 16384K size 4096 blocksize
input: Macintosh mouse button emulation as /class/input/input0
Xen virtual console successfully installed as xvc0
Event-channel device installed.
usbcore: registered new interface driver hiddev
usbcore: registered new interface driver usbhid
drivers/usb/input/hid-core.c: v2.6:USB HID core driver
PNP: No PS/2 controller found. Probing ports directly.
i8042.c: No controller found.
mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice
TCP bic registered
Initializing XFRM netlink socket
NET: Registered protocol family 1
NET: Registered protocol family 17
Using IPI No-Shortcut mode
XENBUS: Device with no driver: device/vif/0
XENBUS: Device with no driver: device/vbd/2049
XENBUS: Device with no driver: device/vbd/2051
drivers/rtc/hctosys.c: unable to open rtc device (rtc0)
Freeing unused kernel memory: 188k freed
Write protecting the kernel read-only data: 795k
Red Hat nash version 6.0.19 starting
Mounting proc filesystem
Mounting sysfs filesystem
Creating /dev
Creating initial device nodes
Setting up hotplug.
Creating block device nodes.
Loading xennet.ko module
netfront: Initialising virtual ethernet driver.
netfront: device eth0 has flipping receive path.
Loading xenblk.ko module
xen-vbd: registered block device major 8
Loading dm-mod.ko module
device-mapper: ioctl: 4.11.0-ioctl (2006-10-12) initialised:
dm-devel@redhat.com
Loading dm-mirror.ko module
Loading dm-crypt.ko module
Loading linear.ko module
md: linear personality registered for level -1
Loading dm-snapshot.ko module
Loading raid1.ko module
md: raid1 personality registered for level 1
Loading raid0.ko module
md: raid0 personality registered for level 0
Loading raid10.ko module
md: raid10 personality registered for level 10
Loading xor.ko module
raid5: automatically using best checksumming function: pIII_sse
   pIII_sse  :  8345.000 MB/sec
raid5: using function: pIII_sse (8345.000 MB/sec)
Loading raid456.ko module
raid6: int32x1   1019 MB/s
raid6: int32x2    778 MB/s
raid6: int32x4    329 MB/s
raid6: int32x8    356 MB/s
raid6: mmxx1      938 MB/s
raid6: mmxx2     1404 MB/s
raid6: sse1x1     768 MB/s
raid6: sse1x2    1589 MB/s
raid6: sse2x1    1311 MB/s
raid6: sse2x2    2919 MB/s
raid6: using algorithm sse2x2 (2919 MB/s)
md: raid6 personality registered for level 6
md: raid5 personality registered for level 5
md: raid4 personality registered for level 4
Loading mbcache.ko module
Loading jbd.ko module
Loading ext3.ko module
Creating root device.
Mounting root filesystem.
kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Setting up other filesystems.
Setting up new root fs
no fstab.sys, mounting internal defaults
Switching to new root and running init.
unmounting old /dev
unmounting old /proc
unmounting old /sys
INIT: version 2.86 booting
                Welcome to Fedora 
                Press 'I' to enter interactive startup.
Setting clock : Sun Jul 11 17:10:52 EDT 2010 [  OK  ]
Starting udev: [  OK  ]
Setting hostname localhost:  [  OK  ]
No devices found
Setting up Logical Volume Management: File descriptor 7 left open
  No volume groups found
[  OK  ]
Checking filesystems
Checking all file systems.
[/sbin/fsck.ext3 (1) -- /] fsck.ext3 -a /dev/sda1 
myroot: clean, 51198/1966080 files, 470903/3932160 blocks
[  OK  ]
Remounting root filesystem in read-write mode:  [  OK  ]
Mounting local filesystems:  mount: special device
/dev/mapper/storageVG-storageFS does not exist
[FAILED]
Enabling local filesystem quotas:  [  OK  ]
Enabling /etc/fstab swaps:  swapon: cannot canonicalize
/dev/mapper/swapVG-swapFS: No such file or directory
[  OK  ]
INIT: Entering runlevel: 4
Entering non-interactive startup
Starting sysstat:  Calling the system activity data collector (sadc): 
[  OK  ]
Bringing up loopback interface:  [  OK  ]
Bringing up interface eth0:  
Determining IP information for eth0... done.
[  OK  ]
Starting fuse:  Loading fuse module.
Mounting fuse control filesystem.
[  OK  ]
Starting system logger: [  OK  ]
Starting kernel logger: [  OK  ]
tarting system message bus: [  OK  ]
Starting ConsoleKit: [  OK  ]
[  OK  ] crond: [  OK  ]
Starting anacron: Could not initialise connection to hald.
Normally this means the HAL daemon (hald) is not running or not ready.
[  OK  ]
-----VERSION : $Rev: 45452 $-----
ec2: -----FIRST RUN-----
ec2: -----GET LATEST AMI TOOLS-----
ec2: Attempting ami-utils update from S3
ec2: Updated ec2-ami-tools from S3
ec2: -----FIND MATCHING MODULES-----
ec2: Kernel modules already appear up to date - directory already exists
ec2: -----RANDOMISING ROOT PASSWORD-----
ec2: -----TRIGGERING HOST KEYS REGENERATION-----
ec2: Removing existing keys
ec2: Bouncing sshd to force regeneration
Stopping sshd: [FAILED]
Generating SSH1 RSA host key: [  OK  ]
Generating SSH2 RSA host key: [  OK  ]
Generating SSH2 DSA host key: [  OK  ]
Starting sshd: [  OK  ]
ec2: Setting sshd to start as a service
ec2: -----CREDENTIALS RETRIEVAL-----
ec2: Attempting to retrieve public key from
[https://169.254.169.254/1.0/meta-data/public-keys/0/openssh-key]
grep: /root/.ssh/authorized_keys: No such file or directory
ec2: New key added to authrozied keys file from parameters
ec2: Setting permissions on /root/.ssh/authorized_keys to 0600
ec2: -----BEGIN SSH HOST KEY FINGERPRINTS-----
ec2: 2048 72:dd:fe:4d:99:29:1b:c9:1d:33:68:88:ac:0a:cc:c0 /etc/ssh/ssh_host_key.pub
ec2: 2048 80:b0:f5:cd:03:50:cd:ac:e9:44:1c:44:6d:c3:c6:36 /etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key.pub
ec2: 1024 0e:15:5d:e7:0e:73:1a:93:ee:46:3a:d0:c6:32:49:a4 /etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key.pub
ec2: -----END SSH HOST KEY FINGERPRINTS-----

Fedora release 8 (Werewolf)
Kernel 2.6.21.7-2.ec2.v1.2.fc8xen on an i686

domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42 login: 
$ ssh -i ~/.ec2/stevens.pem root@ec2-184-73-0-58.compute-1.amazonaws.com
The authenticity of host 'ec2-184-73-0-58.compute-1.amazonaws.com (184.73.0.58)' can't be established.
RSA key fingerprint is 80:b0:f5:cd:03:50:cd:ac:e9:44:1c:44:6d:c3:c6:36.
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes
Warning: Permanently added
'ec2-184-73-0-58.compute-1.amazonaws.com,184.73.0.58' (RSA) to the list of known hosts.

         __|  __|_  )  Fedora 8
         _|  (     /    32-bit
        ___|\___|___|

 Welcome to an EC2 Public Image
                       :-)

    Getting Started
          with EBS Boot

 --[ see /etc/ec2/release-notes ]--

[root@domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42 ~]# df        
Filesystem           1K-blocks      Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1             15481840   1636904  13058504  12% /
none                    874032         0    874032   0% /dev/shm
[root@domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42 ~]# ifconfig eth0
eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 12:31:39:0B:16:42  
          inet addr:10.214.25.172  Bcast:10.214.25.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::1031:39ff:fe0b:1642/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:390 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:253 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:200709 (196.0 KiB)  TX bytes:33674 (32.8 KiB)

[root@domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42 ~]# uname -a
Linux domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42 2.6.21.7-2.ec2.v1.2.fc8xen #1 SMP Fri Nov 20 19:22:36 EST 2009 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux

[root@domU-12-31-39-0B-16-42 ~]# exit
$ ec2-terminate-instances i-93b17ef9
INSTANCE        i-93b17ef9      running shutting-down
$ ec2-get-console-output i-93b17ef9
INIT: Switching to runlevel: 0
INIT: Sending processes the TERM signal
Stopping ConsoleKit: [  OK  ]
Stopping sshd: [  OK  ]
Stopping crond: [  OK  ]
Stopping system message bus: [  OK  ]
Shutting down kernel logger: [  OK  ]
Shutting down system logger: [  OK  ]
Shutting down interface eth0:  [  OK  ]
Shutting down loopback interface:  [  OK  ]
Starting killall:  [  OK  ]
Sending all processes the TERM signal... 
Sending all processes the KILL signal... 
Saving random seed:  
Syncing hardware clock to system time 
Turning off quotas:  
Unmounting file systems:  
mount: /proc is busy
Halting system...
System halted.

$