Add support to transform Resource IDs into Resource Objects

Describe the Feature

I have been working on a script that will link together a variety of EC2 resources via their properties. For example, a VPC object normally looks like this

CidrBlock                   : 10.200.0.0/16
CidrBlockAssociationSet     : {vpc-cidr-assoc-0465bbd81aab7f9ca}
DhcpOptionsId               : dopt-foobar123
InstanceTenancy             : default
Ipv6CidrBlockAssociationSet : {}
IsDefault                   : False
OwnerId                     : 645152623978
State                       : available
Tags                        : {Name}
VpcId                       : vpc-abc123456

And what I am doing in my script is taking that DhcpOptionsId String and turning it into a Amazon.EC2.Model.DhcpOptions object.

[DBG]: C:\Users\adam...\OneD...\Desktop\Proj...\AWS> $filledOutVpc[0] | select * | fl

DhcpOptionsId               : Amazon.EC2.Model.DhcpOptions      
ResourceID                  : vpc-087ba190c62907b7d
Exists                      : True
CidrBlock                   : 10.200.0.0/16
CidrBlockAssociationSet     : {vpc-cidr-assoc-0465bbd81aab7f9ca}
InstanceTenancy             : default
Ipv6CidrBlockAssociationSet : {}
IsDefault                   : False
OwnerId                     : 645152623978
State                       : available
Tags                        : {Name}
VpcId                       : vpc-087ba190c62907b7d

[DBG]: C:\Users\adam...\OneD...\Desktop\Proj...\AWS> $filledOutVpc[0] | select -expand dhcpoptionsid | select 
* | fl

ResourceID         : dopt-41474f23
Exists             : True
DhcpConfigurations : {domain-name, domain-name-servers}
DhcpOptionsId      : dopt-41474f23
OwnerId            : 645152623978
Tags               : {}

(Note that ResourceID and Exists are two custom properties that I add in to help reduce the amount of iterations I have to do in certain parts of the script) However, I have not been able to find a way to do this reliably and consistently without breaking the script. After digging deep into this I think the issue may be that there are no overloaded method definitions for get/set-ing these properties' values with anything except a String.

Is your Feature Request related to a problem?

As far as I am concerned, these cmdlets are working and working really well. Without them I would not have learned as much as I did and I am extremely thankful for them. I am just looking to finish out this fun project that has gotten completely out of hand (like all projects).

Proposed Solution

I have not done any work with C# so I cannot say what would be the best course of action if there even would be one taken. I wish I had a bunch of spare time to sit down, learn C#, and make a viable solution for this. I assume it has to do with there not being an overloaded function definition but that is a wild guess.

Describe alternatives you've considered

As I have more time to work on my script I plan on working around this by making custom objects whenever I have to. Creating EC2 objects with [Amazon.EC2.Model.InstanceBlockDeviceMapping]::new() and then trying to modify them beyond what is currently supported is my issue. It gets worse when I try and add them to a generic list like New-Object 'System.Collections.Generic.List[Amazon.EC2.Model.InstanceBlockDeviceMapping]' because it is expecting a specific type of object and I am feeding it a modified version. The current best solution I have found is to exclude the properties I will be modifying with I create the object; [Amazon.EC2.Model.EbsInstanceBlockDevice]::new() | Select-Object -Property * -ExcludeProperty "VolumeId". I then use ArrayLists instead of generic lists to hold the collections of these objects.

Additional Context

I would say what I am doing is mostly for fun and less so practical. However, it would make doing audits way easier. With just 10 API calls you are able to enumerate a large majority of your EC2 infrastructure. Then this script takes that information and ties it all together for you. I have used earlier versions of this script to locate Snapshots of instances that longer exist, determine all the instances that have a certain port open, audit security groups, and more. I personally found it way easier to get information when instead of being presented with a resource ID, I am instead presented with its actually object.

Map showing all the connections: https://i.imgur.com/bCWEhMM.png Reddit post I made about this while trying to figure out a solution: https://www.reddit.com/r/PowerShell/comments/imhkh2/addmember_not_overwriting_member_even_with_force/ The Get-AWSEC2 script in its current state should it help add context: https://github.com/picnicsecurity/Get-AWSEC2

Environment

→ C:\Users\adam...\OneD...\Desktop\Proj...\AWS> $PSVersionTable

Name                           Value
----                           -----
PSVersion                      7.0.0
PSEdition                      Core
GitCommitId                    7.0.0
OS                             Microsoft Windows 10.0.18363
Platform                       Win32NT
PSCompatibleVersions           {1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0…}
PSRemotingProtocolVersion      2.3
SerializationVersion           1.1.0.1
WSManStackVersion              3.0

This is a :rocket: Feature Request

aws / aws-tools-for-powershell