Assign YAML array from input to key using `yq` - yaml

Question

I'm trying to take a YAML style array I get from an AWS command, and assign it to a key while updating my own YAML.
This represents what I have right now:
yq '(.HostedZones[] | select(.Id=="/hostedzone/ABC123")).ResourceRecordSets |= "'"$(aws route53 list-resource-record-sets --hosted-zone-id "ABC123" --output yaml | yq '.ResourceRecordSets')"'"' -i route53.yml
This is how route53.yml looks like before I run the command:
HostedZones:
- CallerReference: abc-123
Id: /hostedzone/ABC123
Name: domain.name.com.
ResourceRecordSetCount: 5
and this is how route53.yml looks like after:
HostedZones:
- CallerReference: abc-123
Id: /hostedzone/ABC123
Name: domain.name.com.
ResourceRecordSetCount: 5
ResourceRecordSets: |-
- Name: a.domain.name.com.
ResourceRecords:
- Value: some.value.com
TTL: 300
Type: CNAME
- Name: b.domain.name.com.
ResourceRecords:
- Value: some.value.com
TTL: 300
Type: CNAME
- Name: c.domain.name.com.
ResourceRecords:
- Value: some.value.com
TTL: 300
Type: CNAME
- Name: d.domain.name.com.
ResourceRecords:
- Value: some.value.com
TTL: 300
Type: CNAME
- Name: e.domain.name.com.
ResourceRecords:
- Value: some.value.com
TTL: 300
Type: CNAME
As you can see there's a |- right after the key, and it seems like it is treated as multiline string instead of an array of maps. How can I avoid it and assign the array as a YAML array? When I tried manually assigning an array in the style of ['a', 'b', 'c'] and the update works as it should, adding a YAML array under the key, how can I achieve it with the output of the aws command?

Answer 1

The reason why yq is interpreting the output of the $(...) expression as a multiline strine is because you have quoted it; your yq expression, simplified, looks like:
yq 'ResourceRecordSets |= "some string here"'
The quotes mean "this is a string, not a structure", so that's what you get. You could try dropping the quotes, like this:
yq '(.HostedZones[] | select(.Id=="/hostedzone/ABC123")).ResourceRecordSets |= '"$(aws route53 list-resource-record-sets --hosted-zone-id "ABC123" --output yaml | yq '.ResourceRecordSets')" route53.yml
That might work, but it is fragile. A better solution is to have yq parse the output of the subexpression as a separate document, and then merge it as a structured document rather than a big string. Like this:
yq \
'(.HostedZones[] | select(.Id=="/hostedzone/ABC123")).ResourceRecordSets |= input.ResourceRecordSets' \
route53.yml \
<(aws route53 list-resource-record-sets --hosted-zone-id "ABC123" --output yaml)
This takes advantage of the fact that you can provide jq (and hence yq) multiple files on the command line, and then refer to the input variable (described in the IO section of the jq manual). The above command line is structured like this:
yq <expression> <file1> <file2>
Where <file1> is route53.yml, and <file2> is a bash process substitution.
This solution simplifies issues around quoting and formatting.
(You'll note I dropped your use of -i here; that seems to throw yq for a loop, and it's easy to output to a temporary file and then rename it.)

Answer 2

Eventually I solved it using a combination of larsks answer about the unnecessary quotes, and using jq instead of yq (no matter what I did, using solely yq wouldn't work) to assign the array to a separate variable before editing the YAML document:
record_sets=$(aws route53 list-resource-record-sets --hosted-zone-id "ABC123" | jq '.[]')
yq '(.HostedZones[] | select(.Id=="ABC123")).ResourceRecordSets |= '"$record_sets"'' -i route53.yml