Tag: aws lambda

At AWS re:Invent in Las Vegas, Compassion International participated in the Nonprofit Hackathon for Social Good. People don’t usually connect the dots between cutting-edge technology and nonprofits, but this is where it’s needed most. Hackers were challenged to bridge the communication gap between those in need and empathetic people who want to help. No matter your origin or the language you speak, you can connect and meet the needs of a child in poverty.

My grandma is 88-years old with reduced mobility. She lives alone, without a caretaker, in a small village. If she falls, then she is in danger. If something goes wrong when she’s in bed, she might need assistance. With an AWS IoT button, she can call for help in a simple way and potentially save her life. Her village provides free Wi-Fi coverage, so I built an emergency alert system using AWS. When she clicks the AWS IoT button, a series of events will take place to get her the assistance she needs. This can help her in difficult situations. It’s a solution that others can create as well. In this blog post, I’ll show you how to get started.

AWS EdStart members are transforming education in every corner of the globe. Read on for more about three of our members – ArcLab, Lightbulb Education, and Yellowdig. Each of these EdTechs rely on AWS to create a more student-centric learning experience.

From viewing election results to monitoring stock transactions, government, education, and nonprofits are adopting serverless for increased agility and lower costs. Election night presents a challenge for city and county administrators across America. Voters, party workers, journalists, and constituents converge to a precinct’s website to view election results.

Age UK is the UK’s largest charity dedicated to helping everyone make the most of later life. They have the vision to make the UK a great place to grow older and they work every day to achieve this by providing companionship, advice, and support for older people who need it most. Scalability, cost savings, and security are key in delivering Age UK’s services to more than 7 million people every year. In 2012, Age UK turned to AWS to help revamp their technology to better support the older generation in the UK.

During my recent visit to Latin America, I was enchanted by the beauty, grace, and passion of tango dance during a show at the Buenos Aires Faena Hotel. The dancers reflect the Argentine people – honoring their history, tradition, and culture, but are not afraid to innovate, take chances, and lead. I was also amazed with the beauty of the Andes, delivering strength, power, a quiet peace and gentle inspiration. It is with this backdrop that I met with AWS customers in Latin America to discuss the power of cloud computing.

There are many arguments for building a serverless architecture. Chief among them, users only pay for the computing power they use. Organizations can begin by identifying and eliminating the bottlenecks in their workflow. For example, CSIRO Bioinformatics in Sydney, Australia, used AWS X-Ray to systematically evaluate their serverless architecture and, by doing so, improved their runtime by 80%.

A guest post by Chris Shenton, CTO, V!Studios The NASA Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Office at NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) needed to be able to search and make decisions based upon a huge volume of spacesuit safety and test documentation, many of which were only available as scans of paper reports. Timeliness was critical, especially […]

After nearly disappearing in the ‘90s, the spread of child sexual abuse material exploded with the rise of the internet, as child sex trafficking increased with exposure to a greater market online. Today, the problem is complex and still growing. Thorn, a nonprofit, is working to build technology to defend children from sexual abuse.

Just as companies listen to their customers to align the business with their client needs, government organizations listen to their citizens to improve the citizen experience. In order to get feedback, many organizations use different tools with a multi-channel approach, such as customer comments, Helpdesk calls, emails, social media, or mobile apps. Using Amazon Simple […]