Ipa Destroy

/ipa-destroy — Destroy Infrastructure Pattern

This skill tears down a composed infrastructure pattern by executing the teardown targets in generated Makefiles. It validates prerequisites, checks which stacks exist, displays a teardown plan with data loss warnings, requires double confirmation, executes the teardown, verifies deletion, and reports results.

Lifecycle: /ipa-init → /ipa-compose → /ipa-prepare → /ipa-deploy → /ipa-destroy

AWS credential resolution: All aws CLI commands must be prefixed with source .env 2>/dev/null; to load credentials into the environment. Do NOT pass --profile or --region flags explicitly.

What This Skill Does

1. Validates prerequisites (.env, Makefiles, AWS credentials, required tools)
2. Checks which pattern stacks currently exist (pre-teardown status)
3. Displays a teardown plan with data loss warnings
4. Requires double confirmation (including typing the namespace)
5. Runs make -f scripts/deploy.mk teardown (deletes stacks in reverse dependency order)
6. Verifies all stacks are deleted
7. Reports results

What This Skill Does NOT Do

• Does not deploy anything — that's /ipa-deploy's job
• Does not ask "deploy or teardown?" — it proceeds directly to teardown
• Does not generate Makefiles — that's /ipa-compose's job
• Does not create or modify IAM roles — that's /ipa-security's job
• Does not read stack SKILL.md files — Makefiles are the only deployment contract
• Does not call AWS APIs directly — delegates to make which calls aws cloudformation delete-stack
• Does not delete the security stack — security infrastructure is managed by /ipa-security
• Does not delete prepare stacks (ECR, etc.) — prepare infrastructure is managed separately. To tear down prepare stacks manually: make -f scripts/prepare.mk teardown-prepare
• Does not support per-stack targeting — always tears down the full pattern via the aggregate target
• Does not modify .env — it is a read-only consumer of configuration

Information Sources

Step 1: Pre-Flight Validation

Run all checks below and collect results. Report all failures at once with per-item remediation — do not stop at the first failure.

1.1 Verify .env Exists

Check that .env exists at the project root and is non-empty.

If missing: ".env not found. Run /ipa-init to initialize project configuration."

1.2 Verify Required .env Variables

Read .env and verify these variables exist and are non-empty:

Store all variable values for use in subsequent steps.

1.3 Verify Deployment Scripts Exist

Check that scripts/deploy.mk exists and contains a teardown target.

If missing: "scripts/deploy.mk not found. Run /ipa-compose to generate deployment artifacts."

If no teardown target: "scripts/deploy.mk has no teardown target. Run /ipa-compose to regenerate deployment artifacts."

1.4 Verify Security Stack Is Deployed

Run:

source .env 2>/dev/null; aws cloudformation describe-stacks --stack-name {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-security --query 'Stacks[0].StackStatus' --output text

Expected: CREATE_COMPLETE or UPDATE_COMPLETE.

If not deployed: "Security stack {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-security is not deployed. Run /ipa-security first."

1.5 Verify AWS Credentials

Run:

source .env 2>/dev/null; aws sts get-caller-identity

If fails: "AWS credentials are invalid or expired for profile {AWS_PROFILE}. Refresh your credentials and try again."

1.6 Verify Make Is Installed

Run which make.

If missing: "GNU Make is not installed. On macOS it is pre-installed. On Linux: sudo apt install make."

Validation Summary

If any checks fail, display all failures in a single summary table and STOP:

Pre-flight validation failed:

  ✗ .env variable APP_BUILDER_ROLE_ARN missing — Run /ipa-security
  ✗ AWS credentials expired — Refresh credentials for profile {AWS_PROFILE}

Fix the above issues and re-run /ipa-destroy.

If all checks pass: "Pre-flight validation passed. All prerequisites verified."

Step 2: Pre-Teardown Status Check

Before displaying the teardown plan, check which stacks currently exist. This provides a status-aware plan that shows "will delete" vs "already gone."

2.1 Extract Stack Names from deploy.mk

Run make -n -f scripts/deploy.mk teardown and extract the --stack-name values from the output. These are the stacks that the teardown would target.

2.2 Check Each Stack's Current Status

For each stack name extracted above, run:

source .env 2>/dev/null; aws cloudformation describe-stacks --stack-name {stack-name} --query 'Stacks[0].StackStatus' --output text

Categorize each stack:

2.3 Nothing to Destroy

If ALL stacks are in the "Gone" category:

"No pattern stacks to destroy. All stacks have already been deleted."

STOP — there is nothing to tear down.

Step 3: Display Teardown Plan + Warnings

3.1 Show Status-Aware Plan

Display the teardown plan with each stack's current status and the action that will be taken:

⚠️  TEARDOWN PLAN: {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}

  Stack                              Current Status      Action
  ─────────────────────────────────  ──────────────────  ──────
  {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-lambda   CREATE_COMPLETE     DELETE
  {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-cognito  CREATE_COMPLETE     DELETE
  {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-ecr      DOES_NOT_EXIST      skip (already deleted)

WARNING: This will permanently delete all stacks listed above.
Stateful resources (ECR repositories with images, DynamoDB tables with data,
S3 buckets with objects) will be destroyed. This action cannot be undone.

3.2 Show Dry-Run Commands

Run Make dry-run and display the commands:

make -n -f scripts/deploy.mk teardown

Show the output so the builder can see exactly what commands will execute.

Step 4: Double Confirmation

Teardown is a destructive operation. Require two separate confirmations before proceeding.

4.1 First Confirmation

"Are you sure you want to destroy all infrastructure? (yes/no):"

If the builder does not confirm: "Destroy cancelled. No stacks were deleted." STOP.

4.2 Second Confirmation

"Type the namespace {APP_NAMESPACE} to confirm:"

Verify the typed value matches APP_NAMESPACE exactly (case-sensitive).

If the value does not match: "Destroy cancelled. Namespace did not match. No stacks were deleted." STOP.

Step 5: Execute Teardown

Run:

make -f scripts/deploy.mk teardown

Display Make output as it runs. Each target prints its AWS CLI command, providing natural progress indication.

If teardown succeeds (exit code = 0): proceed to Step 6.

If teardown partially fails: Report which stacks were deleted and which remain:

Teardown partially completed:

  ✓ {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-lambda   — deleted
  ✗ {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-cognito  — DELETE_FAILED
  · {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-ecr      — not attempted

Check the failed stack and see the Failure Handling section below.
After fixing the issue, re-run /ipa-destroy — already-deleted stacks will be skipped.

Idempotency: Re-running /ipa-destroy after a partial failure is always safe. The execution layer handles all state transitions:

• Non-existent stack → succeeds silently (already deleted)
• DELETE_FAILED → retries deletion
• *_COMPLETE → proceeds with deletion

Step 6: Post-Teardown Verification

For each stack in the teardown plan, run:

source .env 2>/dev/null; aws cloudformation describe-stacks --stack-name {stack-name} --query 'Stacks[0].StackStatus' --output text

Confirm all return DOES_NOT_EXIST (i.e., the command returns an error indicating the stack does not exist) or DELETE_COMPLETE.

If any stack still exists with a non-deleted status, report it as part of the completion report.

Step 7: Completion Report

Display a structured report:

Destroy Complete: {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}

  All pattern stacks have been deleted:

  ✓ {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-lambda   — deleted
  ✓ {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-cognito  — deleted
  · {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-ecr      — already deleted (skipped)

Note: Security stack {APP_NAMESPACE}-{APP_ENV}-security is preserved.
To remove security infrastructure, use /ipa-security.

Note: Prepare stacks (scripts/prepare.mk) are preserved.
To remove prepare infrastructure: make -f scripts/prepare.mk teardown-prepare

Re-run /ipa-destroy at any time — it is safe to re-run (idempotent).

Failure Handling

Teardown-Specific Errors

Credential Errors

Tool Errors