IoT custom resource - possible race condition

Question

Not sure if it's just me, or if anyone else has experienced this possible race condition, but I have an IoT custom resource construct like the following in a large stack:
```
      const thing = new cr.AwsCustomResource(this, 'thing', {
        onCreate: {
          service: 'Iot',
          action: 'createThing',
          parameters: {
            thingName: '001',
            thingTypeName: 'thing-type'
          },
          physicalResourceId: cr.PhysicalResourceId.of(Date.now().toString()),
        },
        onDelete: {
          service: 'Iot',
          action: 'deleteThing',
          parameters: {
            thingName: '001'
          },
        },
        policy: cr.AwsCustomResourcePolicy.fromSdkCalls({
          resources: cr.AwsCustomResourcePolicy.ANY_RESOURCE,
        }),
      });
      thing.node.addDependency(thingType);
```
...that sometimes runs fine following a `cdk deploy`, and sometimes throws a message like this:
```
18:14:21 | CREATE_FAILED        | Custom::AWS                         | thing/Resource/Default
Received response status [FAILED] from custom resource. Message returned: User: arn:aws:sts::123456789012:assumed-role/Dev-AWS679xxx-xxx/Dev-AWS679xxx-xxx is not authorized to perform: iot:CreateThing on resource: arn:aws:iot:xxx:xxx:thing/001 because no identity-based policy allows the iot:CreateThing action (RequestId: xxxxx)
```
It's as if sometimes the policy is not attached to the assumed role in time before the action to create the thing is carried out.

I'll see if I can produce a small stack that can repeat the condition but in the meantime I'm sending this out in case others have experienced this behaviour.

Thanks,
Gary

Answer

Hi - Thanks for reaching out. Are you hard coding this or this is just an example. Also for race condition I am assuming that you may have another thread/procedure trying to do the same at the same time. If yes, do you want to check existence of the IoT thing in IoT core before proceeding and if exists, then do run this construct. Just a thought.

IoT custom resource - possible race condition

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