AWS Bites

In this episode, we discuss the concept of CloudFormation drift, what causes it, how to detect it, and strategies for resolving it. We explain that drift happens when the actual state of resources diverges from what is defined in the CloudFormation templates. Common causes include manual changes, third party tools, mixing IaC solutions, and automation. We then cover built-in drift detection in CloudFormation and integrating it with alarms. Finally, we suggest approaches for reconciling drift like change sets, deletion protection, and bringing up parallel stacks.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we had the pleasure to interview Farrah Campbell, head of modern compute community at AWS, prolific speaker, and former AWS Hero. We discussed Farrah's career journey from healthcare into tech, tips on public speaking, dealing with imposter syndrome, the pace of innovation in the cloud, and predictions for the future. Farrah shared personal stories and advice for getting started in tech and being an active member of the community. It was inspiring to hear from someone so passionate about helping others learn and grow.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we discuss AWS Lambda provisioned concurrency. We start with a recap of Lambda cold starts and the different concurrency control options. We then explain how provisioned concurrency works to initialize execution environments in advance to avoid cold starts. We cover how to enable it, pricing details, common issues like over/under-provisioning, and alternatives like self-warming functions or using other services like ECS and Fargate.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we discuss Luciano's new book project on using Rust to write AWS Lambda functions. We start with a recap on why Rust is a good fit for Lambda, including performance, efficiency, safety, and low cold start times. Luciano provides details on the book's progress so far, the intended audience, and the current published chapters covering Lambda internals, getting started with Rust Lambda, and building a URL shortener app with DynamoDB. We also explore the differences between traditional publishing and self-publishing, and why Luciano chose the self-publishing route for this book. Luciano shares insights into the writing process with AsciiDoc, code samples, SVG image generation, and using Gumroad for distribution. He invites feedback from listeners who have experience with Rust and Lambda.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

An overview of load balancers, explaining how they distribute traffic across multiple servers and provide high availability. We discuss layer 4 and layer 7 load balancers, detailing their pros and cons. We then focus on AWS load balancers, covering network load balancers and application load balancers in depth, including their features, use cases, and pricing models. We conclude by mentioning some alternatives to AWS load balancers.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

This episode discusses solutions for securely accessing private VPC resources for debugging and troubleshooting. We cover traditional approaches like bastion hosts and VPNs and newer solutions using containers and AWS services like Fargate, ECS, and SSM. We explain how to set up a Fargate task with a container image with the necessary tools, enable ECS integration with SSM, and use SSM to start remote shells and port forwarding tunnels into the container. This provides on-demand access without exposing resources on the public internet. We share a Python script to simplify the process. We suggest ideas for improvements like auto-scaling the container down when idle. Overall, this lightweight containerized approach can provide easy access for debugging compared to managing EC2 instances.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we discuss the newly announced CloudFront Hosting Toolkit from AWS. We provide an overview of the tool, which aims to simplify deploying modern front-end applications to AWS while retaining infrastructure control. We discuss the current capabilities and limitations and share our hands-on experiences trying out the tool. We also talk about alternatives like Vercel and Amplify, and the tradeoffs between convenience VS control. Overall, the toolkit shows promise but is still early-stage. We are excited to see it evolve to support more frameworks and use cases.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

In this episode, we mentioned the following resources:

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we discuss some tips and tricks for optimizing performance when working with Amazon S3 at scale. We start by giving an overview of how S3 works, highlighting the distributed nature of the service and how data is stored redundantly across multiple availability zones for durability. We then dive into specific tips like using multipart uploads and downloads, spreading the load across key namespaces, enabling transfer acceleration, and using S3 byte-range fetches. Overall, we aim to provide developers building S3-intensive applications with practical guidance to squeeze the most performance out of the service.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we provide a comprehensive overview of DynamoDB, including how it compares to relational databases, when to use it, how to get started, writing and querying data, secondary indexes, and single table design. We share our experiences using DynamoDB and discuss the pros and cons compared to traditional SQL databases.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?

In this episode, we provide an overview of Amazon Aurora, a relational database solution on AWS. We discuss its unique capabilities like distinct storage architecture for better performance and faster recovery. We cover concepts like Aurora clusters, reader and writer instances, endpoints, and global databases. We also compare the serverless versions V1 and V2, noting that V2 is more enterprise-ready while V1 scales to zero. We touch on billing and additional features like the data API, RDS query editor, and RDS proxy. Overall, Aurora is powerful and scalable but not trivial to use at global scale. It's best for serious enterprise use cases or variable traffic workloads.

💰 SPONSORS 💰

Do you have any AWS questions you would like us to address?