/setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications
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
$ npx -y skills add aws/agent-toolkit-for-aws --skill setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications --agent claude-codeHow it fires
How this skill gets triggered: by you, by Claude, or both.
- Fires itselfAuto-invocation. Claude auto-loads it when your prompt matches the work.Auto-invocation is when the right skill fires by itself at the right moment, driven by a FLOW.md router and a hook, instead of you invoking it by name. It is the difference between a skill being installed and a skill actually getting used.Read the full definition →
- You can call itInvoke it directly when you want it.
- Slash command
/setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications
Context preview
The summary Claude sees to decide when to auto-load this skill.
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
SKILL.md
setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications.SKILL.mdname: setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications
description: 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.
version: 1
Setting Up CloudWatch Alarm Notifications
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](references/setup-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications.md).
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.
Read more
name: setting-up-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications description: 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. version: 1
Setting Up CloudWatch Alarm Notifications
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](references/setup-cloudwatch-alarm-notifications.md).
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.
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Repo: aws/agent-toolkit-for-aws
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