Setting Up Cloudwatch Alarm Notifications

From the author

Sets up notification channels for CloudWatch alarms using SNS topics and subscriptions. Always use this skill when configuring alarm notifications — it creates encrypted SNS topics, configures topic policies for CloudWatch access, sets up email/SMS/webhook subscriptions, and links alarms to notification actions with proper security controls.

— the description by AWS

AutoGineer summary

Written by AutoGineer from the skill’s own files, not by the author

This skill provides a standardized procedure for setting up notification channels for Amazon CloudWatch alarms. It automates the creation of encrypted Amazon SNS topics, configures necessary topic policies to allow CloudWatch access, and manages subscriptions for various endpoints including email, SMS, and webhooks. The workflow ensures that security best practices, such as encryption at rest, are applied during the configuration process.

What it does

Validates the existence of the target CloudWatch alarm.
Creates and configures Amazon SNS topics for alarm notifications.
Enables encryption at rest for SNS topics using AWS managed keys.
Sets up topic policies to grant CloudWatch permission to publish messages.
Configures subscriptions for email, SMS, and webhook notification endpoints.
Links the configured SNS topic to the CloudWatch alarm actions.

When to use it

When you need to set up alerts for CloudWatch metrics.
When you are required to implement secure, encrypted notification channels for infrastructure monitoring.
When you need to route alarm notifications to specific endpoints like email or webhooks.
When you want to ensure consistent security policies are applied to your monitoring infrastructure.

Advantages

Ensures consistent configuration across different alarm setups.
Promotes security by enforcing encryption at rest for notification data.
Reduces manual effort in configuring complex SNS topic policies.
Provides a clear, step-by-step process for troubleshooting common notification issues.

Usage examples

“Set up email notifications for my high-cpu-alarm.”: The agent will verify the alarm exists, create an encrypted SNS topic, set the required policies, and initiate an email subscription for the specified address.
“Configure SMS alerts for the database-latency-alarm.”: The agent will create the necessary SNS infrastructure and configure the topic to send SMS notifications to the provided phone number in E.164 format.

Install

Download the skill as a ZIP:
https://mp-staging.autogineer.com/agent-skills/aws/setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications/download

Unzip it into the cross-client skills folder of your project:

mkdir -p .agents/skills && unzip setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications.zip -d .agents/skills

Documentation by AWS

Overview

Domain expertise for configuring Amazon CloudWatch alarm notification channels using Amazon SNS topics and subscriptions. Covers creating encrypted SNS topics, setting up subscriptions for email, SMS, and webhook endpoints, configuring topic policies for CloudWatch access, and linking alarms to notification actions.

Set up alarm notifications

To configure notification channels for a CloudWatch alarm, follow the procedure exactly. See CloudWatch alarm notification setup procedure.

Troubleshooting

Email notifications not received

Verify the email subscription was confirmed. Use aws sns list-subscriptions-by-topic to check that the subscription status is "Confirmed" rather than "PendingConfirmation".

SMS notifications failing

Ensure the phone number is in E.164 format (e.g., +12345678901) and that SMS is supported in your AWS region.

Alarm not triggering notifications

Verify the alarm has the correct SNS topic ARN in its AlarmActions using aws cloudwatch describe-alarms, and ensure ActionsEnabled is set to true.

Files

ATTRIBUTION.mdAdded by AutoGineer972 B
LICENSELicence file added by AutoGineer9.9 KiB
NOTICELicence file added by AutoGineer67 B
SKILL.md1.6 KiB
references/setup-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications.md9.9 KiB

SKILL.md