problems connecting to an instance using EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint

Question

I followed the guide 
[https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/Connect-using-EC2-Instance-Connect-Endpoint.html ](Connect to your instances without requiring a public IPv4 address using EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint)
and this one 
[https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/ec2-instance-connect-methods.html#ec2-instance-connect-connecting-aws-cli](Connect using EC2 Instance Connect) 
to  connect  to my instance using "EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint" it works using the console but when trying to use my console and entering the command

```
aws ec2-instance-connect send-ssh-public-key --region us-east-1   \
--availability-zone us-east-1a  \
--instance-id i-001234a4bf70dec41EXAMPLE \
--instance-os-user ec2-user \
--ssh-public-key ./my_key.pub
```
I get the error 
```
Parameter validation failed:
Invalid length for parameter SSHPublicKey, value: 12, valid min length: 80
```
to generate my key I did `ssh-keygen -t rsa -f my_key`

I am bit lost on what to do next

Answer

Try specifying files as follows.  
You need to add "file://" to read the file.  
```
aws ec2-instance-connect send-ssh-public-key --region us-east-1   \
--availability-zone us-east-1a  \
--instance-id i-001234a4bf70dec41EXAMPLE \
--instance-os-user ec2-user \
--ssh-public-key file://my_key.pub
```

Answer

Hi, you need to generate the first pair of key for an EC2 instance via EC2 key generation procedure because EC2 instance needs to be loaded with the public key in order to allow you to connect.

More details at https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/ec2-key-pairs.html

To create such a key pair, follow https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/create-key-pairs.html#having-ec2-create-your-key-pair

problems connecting to an instance using EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint

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