ICYMI: Serverless Q3 2021

Welcome to the 15th edition of the AWS Serverless ICYMI (in case you missed it) quarterly recap. Every quarter, we share all of the most recent product launches, feature enhancements, blog posts, webinars, Twitch live streams, and other interesting things that you might have missed!

In case you missed our last ICYMI, check out what happened last quarter here.

AWS Lambda

You can now choose next-generation AWS Graviton2 processors in your Lambda functions. This Arm-based processor architecture can provide up to 19% better performance at 20% lower cost. You can configure functions to use Graviton2 in the AWS Management Console, API, CloudFormation, and CDK. We recommend using the AWS Lambda Power Tuning tool to see how your function compare and determine the price improvement you may see.

All Lambda runtimes built on Amazon Linux 2 support Graviton2, with the exception of versions approaching end-of-support. The AWS Free Tier for Lambda includes functions powered by both x86 and Arm-based architectures.

You can also use the Python 3.9 runtime to develop Lambda functions. You can choose this runtime version in the AWS Management Console, AWS CLI, or AWS Serverless Application Model (AWS SAM). Version 3.9 includes a range of new features and performance improvements.

Lambda now supports Amazon MQ for RabbitMQ as an event source. This makes it easier to develop serverless applications that are triggered by messages in a RabbitMQ queue. This integration does not require a consumer application to monitor queues for updates. The connectivity with the Amazon MQ message broker is managed by the Lambda service.

Lambda has added support for up to 10 GB of memory and 6 vCPU cores in AWS GovCloud (US) Regions and in the Middle East (Bahrain), Asia Pacific (Osaka), and Asia Pacific (Hong Kong) Regions.

AWS Step Functions

Step Functions now integrates with the AWS SDK, supporting over 200 AWS services and 9,000 API actions. You can call services directly from the Amazon States Language definition in the resource field of the task state. This allows you to work with services like DynamoDB, AWS Glue Jobs, or Amazon Textract directly from a Step Functions state machine. To learn more, see the SDK integration tutorial.

AWS Amplify

The Amplify Admin UI now supports importing existing Amazon Cognito user pools and identity pools. This allows you to configure multi-platform apps to use the same user pools with different client IDs.

Amplify CLI now enables command hooks, allowing you to run custom scripts in the lifecycle of CLI commands. You can create bash scripts that run before, during, or after CLI commands. Amplify CLI has also added support for storing environment variables and secrets used by Lambda functions.

Amplify Geo is in developer preview and helps developers provide location-aware features to their frontend web and mobile applications. This uses the Amazon Location Service to provide map UI components.

Amazon EventBridge

The EventBridge schema registry now supports discovery of cross-account events. When schema registry is enabled on a bus, it now generates schemes for events originating from another account. This helps organize and find events in multi-account applications.

Amazon DynamoDB

The new DynamoDB console experience is now the default for viewing and managing DynamoDB tables. This makes it easier to manage tables from the navigation pane and also provided a new dedicated Items page. There is also contextual guidance and step-by-step assistance to help you perform common tasks more quickly.

API Gateway

API Gateway can now authenticate clients using certificate-based mutual TLS. Previously, this feature only supported AWS Certificate Manager (ACM). Now, customers can use a server certificate issued by a third-party certificate authority or ACM Private CA. Read more about using mutual TLS authentication with API Gateway.

The Serverless Developer Advocacy team built the Amazon API Gateway CORS Configurator to help you configure cross origin resource scripting (CORS) for REST and HTTP APIs. Fill in the information specific to your API and the AWS SAM configuration is generated for you.

Serverless blog posts

July

• Jul 6 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Implementing application workload security – part 1
• Jul 6 – Translating content dynamically by using Amazon S3 Object Lambda
• Jul 7 – Using Amazon MQ for RabbitMQ as an event source for Lambda
• Jul 8 – Developing evolutionary architecture with AWS Lambda
• Jul 8 – Using serverless to load test Amazon API Gateway with authorization
• Jul 9 – Integrating Amazon API Gateway private endpoints with on-premises networks
• Jul 12 – Understanding data streaming concepts for serverless applications
• Jul 12 – Coming soon: Expansion of AWS Lambda states to all functions
• Jul 13 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Implementing application workload security – part 2
• Jul 21 – Introducing AWS SAM Pipelines: Automatically generate deployment pipelines for serverless applications
• Jul 22 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Regulating inbound request rates – part 1
• Jul 26 – Creating a single-table design with Amazon DynamoDB
• Jul 27 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Regulating inbound request rates – part 2
• Jul 27 –
  Automating Amazon CloudWatch dashboards and alarms for Amazon Managed Workflows for Apache Airflow
• Jul 29 – Building a serverless multiplayer game that scales: Part 2

August

• Aug 3 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Building in resiliency – part 1
• Aug 10 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Building in resiliency – part 2
• Aug 10 – Understanding VPC links in Amazon API Gateway private integrations
• Aug 11 – Authenticating and authorizing Amazon MQ users with Lightweight Directory Access Protocol
• Aug 16 – Python 3.9 runtime now available in AWS Lambda
• Aug 17 – Configuring CORS on Amazon API Gateway APIs
• Aug 17 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Optimizing application performance – part 1
• Aug 23 – Adding resiliency to AWS CloudFormation custom resource deployments
• Aug 24 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Optimizing application performance – part 2
• Aug 26 – Sending mobile push notifications and managing device tokens with serverless applications
• Aug 30 – Building a serverless GIF generator with AWS Lambda: Part 1
• Aug 31 – Increasing performance of Java AWS Lambda functions using tiered compilation
• Aug 31 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Optimizing application performance – part 3

September

• Sep 2 – Building a serverless distributed application using a saga orchestration pattern
• Sep 7 – Building well-architected serverless applications: Optimizing application costs
• Sep 13 – Building a serverless GIF generator with AWS Lambda: Part 2

Tech Talks & Events

We hold AWS Online Tech Talks covering serverless topics throughout the year. These are listed in the Serverless section of the AWS Online Tech Talks page. We also regularly deliver talks at conferences and events around the world, speak on podcasts, and record videos you can find to learn in bite-sized chunks.

Here are some from Q3:

• Choosing Events, Queues, Topics, and Streams in Your Serverless Application with Talia Nassi.
• Getting Started with Serverless for Developers with Ben Smith.

Videos

Serverless Office Hours – Tues 10 AM PT

Weekly live virtual office hours. In each session we talk about a specific topic or technology related to serverless and open it up to helping you with your real serverless challenges and issues. Ask us anything you want about serverless technologies and applications.

• YouTube: youtube.com/serverlessland
• Twitch: twitch.tv/aws

July

• Jul 6 – AWS Step Functions Workflow Studio
• Jul 20 – AWS Messaging and Events – AWS Lambda with Amazon MSK
• Jul 26 – Happy 15th Birthday to Amazon SQS!
• Jul 27 – Serverless Surprise! – SAM Pipelines

August

• Aug 3 – AWS Lambda – The patterns collection
• Aug 10 – AWS Step Functions – Ask the Experts
• Aug 17 – Amazon API Gateway – The CORS Episode
• Aug 24 – Serverless Surprise! – Serverless Heroes & Community Builders!
• Aug 31 – AWS Messaging & Events – Processing DynamoDB change data

September

• Sep 7 – AWS Lambda – The GIF Creator
• Sep 14 – AWS Step Functions – Near real time media conversion
• Sep 21 – AWS SAM Accelerate
• Sep 28 – AWS Messaging & Events – Large payloads with Amazon EventBridge

DynamoDB Office Hours

Are you an Amazon DynamoDB customer with a technical question you need answered? If so, join us for weekly Office Hours on the AWS Twitch channel led by Rick Houlihan, AWS principal technologist and Amazon DynamoDB expert. See upcoming and previous shows

• Jul 28 – Building a SAM template for single table AppSync
• Aug 11 – Cost optimization best practices
• Aug 18 – Building serverless applications, best practices
• Sep 8 – Modeling a comparison shopping service
• Sep 15 – Modeling a hotel reservation service

Still looking for more?

The Serverless landing page has more information. The Lambda resources page contains case studies, webinars, whitepapers, customer stories, reference architectures, and even more Getting Started tutorials.

You can also follow the Serverless Developer Advocacy team on Twitter to see the latest news, follow conversations, and interact with the team.

• Eric Johnson: @edjgeek
• James Beswick: @jbesw
• Ben Smith: @benjamin_l_s
• Julian Wood: @julian_wood
• Talia Nassi: @talia_nassi