atmos-profiles

name	atmos-profiles
description	Atmos profiles: profile directories, --profile and ATMOS_PROFILE activation, profile merge behavior, environment switching, and routing profile-specific auth/toolchain/config overrides
metadata	{"copyright":"Copyright Cloud Posse, LLC 2026","version":"1.0.0","category":"core-config"}

Atmos Profiles

Use this skill when configuring or troubleshooting Atmos profiles: named configuration overlays selected with --profile or ATMOS_PROFILE.

Purpose

Profiles let teams switch configuration contexts without changing the base project config. Use them for developer, CI, tenant, cloud account, or environment-specific overrides.

atmos --profile developer terraform plan vpc -s dev
ATMOS_PROFILE=ci atmos terraform deploy vpc -s prod

Use --profile with no value in an interactive terminal to open a multi-select picker of every discovered profile. Non-interactive contexts (CI, scripts) must pass --profile=<name> or ATMOS_PROFILE explicitly.

Profile Layout

Keep profile files focused and aligned with the sections they override:

profiles/
  developer/
    atmos.yaml
    auth.yaml
  ci/
    atmos.yaml
    auth.yaml

Profile configuration is merged into the active Atmos configuration. Put shared defaults in the base config, then keep each profile to the smallest override needed.

Profile Config

Configure the profile search location in root config when the default location is not sufficient:

profiles:
  base_path: profiles

Example profiles/ci/auth.yaml override:

auth:
  providers:
    github-oidc:
      kind: github/oidc
      region: us-east-1
  identities:
    deploy:
      kind: aws/assume-role
      via:
        provider: github-oidc

Routing

Need	Load
Profile activation, directory layout, merge behavior	stay in atmos-profiles
Auth providers, identities, OIDC, SSO, keyring in profiles	atmos-auth
CI use of ATMOS_PROFILE	atmos-ci
Tool versions or registries that differ by profile	atmos-toolchain
Base paths and profile-relative file layout	atmos-project-layout

Guardrails

• Keep profile overrides small and predictable; avoid duplicating the whole base atmos.yaml.
• Use the same provider and identity names across profiles when callers should not care which profile is active.
• Prefer ATMOS_PROFILE in CI and --profile for one-off local commands.
• Verify the active merged configuration with atmos describe config or the relevant atmos describe component command.