That's cool, but it seems a bit overcomplicated. We use an alias for each instance and keep that alias file in github. A new dev comes on board, they git pull, and they are off and running.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this python script better?

We run several dozen instances, so managing that list manually became cumbersome. Being able to create an instance, and moments later have that instance easily SSH-able by anyone on the team without requiring an additional commit & pull has been useful for us.

I guess... We manage over 200 instances, and the additional commit & pull has never been an issue for us.

I suppose a different approach has merit, but you're leaving out the dev time with maintenance and updates to your software that manages this. Our solution avoids that.

Cool that you open sourced it though. Good stuff...

Are they all static (elastic) IPs?

I have a similar alias file for the instances which have static IPs. But not all of my servers do. E.g. my loadbalancer has a static IP, but why would all of my app servers have one?

I have a similar script to generate names.

so you have a host naming schema like the rest of us, big deal yawn