## Connect Idealstack to AWS

Idealstack works by connecting to your AWS account over the AWS API and managing resources within it. To do this it requires a user within your AWS account with an _Access Key_ and _Secret_ that you enter when creating a new organization in Idealstack.

# How to create the IAM user

1. Click this button to deploy our cloudformation template which will create the user. This will open in a new tab:

[Create Idealstack User](https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudformation/home?region=us-east-1#/stacks/create/review?filter=active&templateURL=https:%2F%2Fs3.amazonaws.com%2Fidealstack-public-resources-us-east-1%2Fcreate-iam-user.json.template&stackName=idealstack-user)

2. Check the box _"I acknowledge that AWS Cloudformation might create IAM resources"_ and then click the _Create_ button

3. Wait for a moment until the stack applies and changes status to _CREATE_COMPLETE_

4. Then click on _Outputs_ to see the _AwsAccessKeyId_ and _AwsSecretAccessKey_

5. Paste these details into the Idealstack system: