Glossary
Key terms and concepts used throughout the DevRamps documentation.
Artifact
A deployable package produced by your pipeline. Artifacts can be Docker images (stored in Amazon ECR) or bundles (zip archives stored in S3). Artifacts are built once and then mirrored to each stage's target account as needed.
Artifact Mirroring
The process of copying a built artifact (Docker image or bundle) from the CI/CD account to a stage's target AWS account and region. This happens automatically before each stage deploys.
Bake Period
A configurable waiting period after a deployment completes, during which teams can observe metrics and logs before the pipeline promotes to the next stage. If issues are detected during the bake period, the deployment can be rolled back. See Bake Time.
Bootstrap
The one-time setup process that provisions the AWS resources DevRamps needs in your accounts. This includes creating an OIDC identity provider, IAM roles, and a CloudFormation stack. Run via npx @devramps/cli bootstrap. See CLI.
CI/CD Account
The central AWS account that DevRamps uses for shared resources like artifact storage (ECR repositories, S3 buckets), Terraform state files, and secret encryption keys. If you use AWS Organizations, this is typically a dedicated account separate from your deployment targets. Referenced in expressions as organization.cicd_account_id.
Deployment
A single execution of your pipeline triggered by a code push. Each deployment processes stages sequentially — building artifacts, then deploying to each stage in order (e.g., staging before production).
Ephemeral Environment
A temporary, lock-based deployment target defined in your pipeline YAML. Ephemeral environments enable ad-hoc testing and agentic integrations by providing on-demand environments that run the same deployment steps as your regular stages. Each environment supports a single active session at a time. See Ephemeral Environments.
Expressions
Dynamic value placeholders using ${{ }} syntax that are resolved at different phases of a deployment. For example, ${{ stage.account_id }} resolves to the current stage's AWS account ID. See Expressions.
Managed Resources
AWS resources that DevRamps creates and manages in your accounts on your behalf, such as ECR repositories, S3 buckets for artifacts, KMS encryption keys, and IAM roles. These are created during bootstrap and managed through the DevRamps dashboard.
OIDC Federation
OpenID Connect federation — the authentication mechanism DevRamps uses to securely access your AWS accounts without storing long-lived access keys. During bootstrap, an OIDC identity provider is created in your AWS account that trusts DevRamps, allowing it to assume short-lived IAM roles.
Pipeline
A deployment configuration defined in a pipeline.yaml file inside your repository's .devramps/ directory. A pipeline describes what to build, where to deploy, and in what order. See Pipeline Configuration.
Pipeline Synthesis
The process where DevRamps reads, validates, and parses your pipeline.yaml file at the start of each deployment. During synthesis, the pipeline definition is checked for errors, compared against the previous version, and prepared for execution. If the definition has changed, an approval may be required.
Session
An active lock on an ephemeral environment. A session is created when an environment is claimed (via PR event or API call) and released when the PR is closed, an API release is called, or the idle timeout expires. While a session is active, only the lock holder can trigger deployments to that environment. See Ephemeral Environments.
Revision
A numbered identifier for each deployment, incremented sequentially. Revision 1 is your first deployment, revision 2 is the next push, and so on. Revisions are used to track which version of your code is deployed to each stage.
Stage
A deployment environment within a pipeline (e.g., "staging", "production"). Each stage targets a specific AWS account and region, and stages execute sequentially. A deployment must succeed in one stage before promoting to the next. See Stages.
Stage Promotion
The automatic advancement of a deployment from one stage to the next after the current stage succeeds. Promotion can be blocked by deployment windows, manual holds, or rollback states. See Stage Controls.
Step
A single action within a stage, such as running Terraform, deploying to ECS, or executing a test suite. Steps within a stage can run sequentially or in parallel using goes_after. See Steps.
Step Registry
A GitHub repository containing custom step implementations built with the DevRamps SDK. When you push to a step registry, DevRamps builds and registers your custom steps so they can be used in pipelines. See Custom Steps.
Target Account
The AWS account that a stage deploys to. Each stage specifies its target account and region in the deployment_target configuration. This is where your application infrastructure and services run.