Bash/AWSCLI/JQ method to start an EC2 Instance and Wait for Ping Status Online (Instance ID can be an ADO variable or modified)

start-ec2-instance.sh

#!/bin/bash

INSTANCE_ID="$(InstanceID)"
REGION="us-east-2"
PING_STATUS=""

aws ec2 start-instances --instance-ids $INSTANCE_ID --region $REGION

while :; do
  # Run the AWS CLI command and capture the response
  FOO=$(aws ssm describe-instance-information \
    --instance-information-filter-list key=InstanceIds,valueSet=$INSTANCE_ID \
    --region $REGION)

  # Extract the PingStatus using jq
  PING_STATUS=$(echo "$FOO" | jq -r '.InstanceInformationList[0]?.PingStatus // empty')

  # Check if the PingStatus is Online
  if [ "$PING_STATUS" == "Online" ]; then
    echo "Instance is online!"
    break
  else
    echo "Waiting for SSM to come online. Re-checking..."
  fi

  # Pause before the next iteration
  sleep 4
done