A graphical user interface isn't the only way for Amazon Web Services customers to control their cloud deployments. Amazon this week unveiled the AWS Command Line Interface (CLI), capable of controlling the Elastic Compute Cloud, Simple Storage Service, and about 20 other parts of AWS.

"Graphical user interfaces (e.g. the AWS Management Console) are great, but nothing beats the expressiveness of the command line!" Amazon wrote.

Users can download and configure the CLI to work in their Linux, OS X, or Windows command line environments. Python 2.6 or higher and a package installation tool is required to get started on Linux and OS X, while the Windows version can be installed from an MSI file.

The new AWS CLI is in addition to previous command line tools based on Java and for Windows PowerShell. It was in a developer preview before being moved to general availability this week. The aim is to make it easier for developers to get started and provide a single interface for lots of Amazon services.

Amazon provided a list of commands for each service. On the Elastic Compute Cloud, these include starting and stopping instances, managing VPNs, creating and copying snapshots, and many more. For the Simple Storage Service, there are file operations such as copying, moving, syncing, or creating and removing storage buckets.

Not every Amazon service is available from the command line. One commenter on Amazon's announcement pointed out that the Glacier service for long-term storage is absent so far.

The AWS Command Line Interface is an open source project, with source code available on GitHub.