Resources are the actual entities that you use when you use Elastic Compute Service (ECS). Each create operation may generate corresponding resources, such as ECS instances, auto provisioning groups, custom images, snapshots, disks, security groups, and elastic network interfaces (ENIs).
Limits
Before you use a Resource Access Management (RAM) user to create and manage resources, you must use your Alibaba Cloud account to grant the required permissions to the RAM user. For more information, see Control access to resources by using RAM users.
The number of resources that can be created and retained varies based on your ECS usage. For more information, see Limits.
Resource IDs
Each resource has a resource ID. The resource ID serves as a unique identifier of the resource and makes your search and management of the resource easier. A resource ID consists of the first letter of the resource, a hyphen (-), and a string of a fixed length. Examples: instance ID i-bp13izg0l4s3********, custom image ID m-bp1gbwvlscsk********, and launch template ID lt-bp18i1ibppnr********.
In code or CLI operations, the values of some parameters must be resource IDs. For example, the following command can be run to start an ECS instance whose ID is i-bp13izg0l4s3********:
aliyun ecs StartInstance --InstanceId i-bp13izg0l4s3********Resource locations
The following table describes the limits on the regions and zones in which ECS resources reside. For more information, see Regions and zones.
Resource | Location | Description |
Instance | Zone | An ECS instance is tied to the zone in which it is created. Within the same region, the availability of instance types varies based on zones. |
Reserved instance | Zone or region |
|
Image | Region |
|
Elastic Block Storage (EBS) device | Zone | An EBS device can be attached only to ECS instances within the same zone. |
Storage capacity unit (SCU) | Region | An SCU can be used to offset the pay-as-you-go bills of disks within the same region. |
Snapshot | Region | A snapshot can be used to back up data of the corresponding disk within the same region. |
Security group | Region | If you do not configure a cloud service for communication over the Internet, you cannot enable ECS instances within security groups in different regions to communicate over the internal network by adding security group rules. |
SSH key pair | Region | You can bypass the region limits by importing SSH key pairs. You can use a tool to create an SSH key pair and import it to the region in which you want to use it. For more information, see Import an SSH key pair. |
Instance RAM role | Region | An instance RAM role can be assigned only to ECS instances within the same region. |
ENI | Region | An ENI can be bound only to ECS instances within the same region. |
Launch template | Region | A launch template is tied to its region. You must specify the zone where the launch template is used to create ECS instances. |
Deployment set | Region | ECS instances within the same region can be added to the same deployment set. |
Auto provisioning group | Region | An auto provisioning group is tied to its region. You must specify the zone where the auto provisioning group creates pay-as-you-go or preemptible instances. |
Tag | Region | A tag can be added only to ECS instances within the same region. |
Cloud Assistant command | Region | A Cloud Assistant command can be run only on ECS instances within the same region. |
References
You can use the following methods to classify and manage your cloud resources:
NoteFor more information about resource management methods, see What is Resource Management?
You can group your cloud resources based on the usage, permissions, and ownership of the resources. Resource groups help you simplify resource grouping and permission management within a single Alibaba Cloud account. You can manage resources of multiple users and projects at different levels within your enterprise. For more information, see Resource Group overview or Resource groups.
If your account has different types of ECS resources that are associated with each other, you can add tags to the ECS resources. This allows you to classify and manage the ECS resources in a fine-grained manner. For example, you can collect cost statistics and perform O&M and monitoring on the ECS resources. For more information, see Overview.
When you use ECS, you must focus on the quota and privileges of resources. For more information, see Overview.
If you want to view the information about your ECS resources, you can directly search for the resources or search by tag. For more information, see Search for resources or Search for resources by tag.