Join us as we dive into the new local unit testing capabilities for AWS Step Functions with Jas Narula, Product Manager from the Step Functions team. We explore how developers can now test their workflows locally using the enhanced Test State API, moving beyond the limitations of the discontinued Step Functions Local container.

Jas walks us through the new mocking capabilities, support for advanced states like Map and Parallel, and how this API-based approach gives you the same production runtime for testing.

We also discuss the partnership with LocalStack for offline testing, the developer experience with popular testing frameworks like PyTest and Jest, and why this new approach makes Step Functions development more like traditional test-driven development.

Whether you're orchestrating Lambda functions, calling Bedrock APIs, or building complex business workflows, this episode shows you how to test with confidence before deploying to the cloud.

With Jas Narula, Product Manager, AWS

Step Functions

Blog: Enhanced local testing in AWS Step Functions

LocalStack

In this episode, we dive deep into AWS Builder Center, the new community platform designed to consolidate all AWS developer resources into one central hub. Roopal Jain, Software Development Engineer on the Builder Center team, explains how this platform brings together previously scattered AWS community properties like re:Post, Skill Builder, and community.aws into a unified experience for builders.

Beyond exploring what Builder Center offers - from articles and events to toolboxes organized by programming language - we take a technical deep dive into how the team built this large-scale web application. Rupal shares the architectural decisions behind their serverless microservices approach, the challenges of integrating Neptune graph database for social features like user following, and creative solutions for handling dual authentication methods in API Gateway.

The conversation reveals real-world implementation challenges that many developers face, from VPC networking complexities to service-to-service authentication patterns. We also discuss Builder ID, AWS's new individual identity system, and get a glimpse of what's coming next for the platform.

With Roopal Jain, Sr. Software Developer, AWS

Builder center

In this episode, we dive deep into Amazon ECS Managed Instances, a new compute option that bridges the gap between EC2 and Fargate for container deployments. Our guest Olly Pomeroy, AWS Container Specialist, explains how this new offering provides the flexibility of EC2 with the managed experience of Fargate. Learn about the architecture behind ECS Managed Instances, its pricing model, and how it handles instance lifecycle management automatically. Discover how AWS manages the underlying operating system using Bottlerocket OS, providing enhanced security through a read-only file system. Whether you're running GPU workloads, need specific instance types, or want to optimize costs, this episode covers everything you need to know about this new deployment option for containerized applications.

With Olly Pomeroy, Senior Specialist Solution Architect, Containers, AWS

Launch: Announcing Amazon ECS Managed Instances for containerized applications

Amazon ECS

BottleRocket

Podcast: the platform at Adobe

In this follow-up episode of the AWS Developers Podcast, we continue the conversation with Alex Huides, Principal Network Specialist Solutions Architect at AWS, focusing on Amazon VPC Lattice. We explore how developers can simplify networking concerns while maintaining robust connectivity between applications. Alex explains how VPC Lattice introduces a new boundary concept called service networks, which allows applications to communicate across accounts and VPCs regardless of IP overlap issues. The discussion covers how VPC Lattice abstracts away complex networking details, replacing traditional load balancers while providing secure, private connectivity between services. This episode demonstrates how AWS is removing undifferentiated heavy lifting in networking, making it easier for developers to focus on building applications.

With Alexandra Huides, Principal Network Specialist Solutions Architect, AWS

Part 1 of this two-parts series. Should developer care about networking?

What is Amazon VPC Lattice?

Podcast episode with Moonpig.com

Getting started with VPC Lattice

VPC Lattice launch blog post

AWS Networking Essentials

In this episode of the AWS Developers Podcast, we dive deep into the world of networking from a developer's perspective. Join host Sebastien Stormacq and guest Alex Huides, Principal Network Specialist Solutions Architect at AWS, as they explore why developers should care about networking in the cloud. They discuss the evolution of networking roles from traditional IT to cloud environments, explain fundamental AWS networking concepts, and examine various connectivity options like VPC Peering, Transit Gateway, and PrivateLink. The conversation highlights the challenges of managing network connectivity at scale in multi-account and multi-region architectures, while setting the stage for a deeper discussion about Amazon VPC Lattice in next week's episode.

With Alexandra Huides, Principal Network Specialist Solutions Architect, AWS

AWS Networking Essentials

In this episode of the AWS Developers Podcast, we dive deep into Amazon Bedrock Agent Core Identity with Abram Douglas. Learn how this new service helps developers manage identities and authentication flows for AI agents at scale. Discover the seven core components of Agent Core and understand how the identity service simplifies complex OAuth2 flows and token management. Whether you're building AI agents that need to interact with third-party services like Google Calendar or Slack, this episode explains how Agent Core Identity removes the undifferentiated heavy lifting of identity management, token vaulting, and secure credential handling. Perfect for developers looking to deploy production-ready AI agents with enterprise-grade security.

With Abrom Douglas, Solution Architect, Amazon Cognito

AgentCore

AgentCore Identity

Abrom's blog post about AgentCore Identity

AgentCore Identity sample code

In this episode of the AWS Developers Podcast, we dive deep into Strands Agents, AWS's open-source framework for building AI agents. Our guest Arron Bailiss, Principal Engineer and Tech Lead for Strands, explains how this framework evolved from an internal AWS tool to a developer-friendly, open-source solution. Learn how Strands simplifies AI agent development with just a few lines of code while maintaining production-ready capabilities. Aaron discusses the framework's unique model-driven approach, its support for both MCP and A2A protocols, and how it powers various AWS services including Amazon Q Developer and AWS Glue. Discover how Strands enables multi-agent systems through swarms, supports various deployment options, and get insights into the roadmap including TypeScript support and voice agent capabilities.

With Arron Bailiss, Principal Engineer, Strands Agents

Strands Agents

Strands on GitHub

In this episode, we dive deep into Moonpig's migration journey from an on-premise ASP.NET monolithic application to a fully serverless architecture on AWS. Richard Pearson, Head of Engineering, and Alexis Lowe, Principal Engineer at Moonpig, share their experience transforming a 25-year-old e-commerce platform. They discuss how they tackled the challenges of migrating from SQL Server to DynamoDB, implemented multi-region deployment, and achieved seamless scalability for their peak trading periods. Learn about their "no VPC" policy, their approach to observability, and how they organized their teams to embrace DevOps culture. This episode is particularly relevant for organizations considering a similar journey to serverless architecture or looking to scale their platforms globally.

With Richard Pearson, Head of Engineering, Moonpig ; With Alexis Lowe, Principal Engineer, Moonpig

Moonpig

Update Oct 25.: After we recorded this episode (July 10th 2025), AWS launched Amazon Bedrock AgentCore (that went in preview on July 16th, 2025) and generally available since Oct. 13rd, 2025. AgentCore is the recommanded solution to deploy your MCP agents on AWS. We keep this episode available as a learning experience but deploying MCP on Lambda is not the recommanded architecture for your production workloads.

In this episode, we dive deep into MCP (Model Context Protocol) servers on AWS Lambda. We explore what MCP is, how it enables AI systems to interact with tools through standardized protocols, and practical implementations on AWS Lambda. The discussion covers authentication mechanisms, deployment strategies, and the future potential of MCP servers as a marketplace for AI capabilities. Whether you're building AI-powered applications or interested in exposing your business capabilities to AI systems, this episode provides valuable insights into the technical aspects and business opportunities of MCP servers.

With Alexis Philippart de Foy, Solution Architect, AWS

MCP Servers on Lambda, GitHub repo

Building a Serverless remote MCP Server on AWS

In this episode, we explore how Phagos, a French biotech startup, combines biology, data science, and cloud computing to combat antimicrobial resistance. Their innovative approach uses bacteriophages - natural predators of bacteria - as an alternative to antibiotics. We discuss how they leverage AWS services, including SageMaker and batch processing, to analyze genomic data and train specialized language models that can predict phage-bacteria interactions. Our guests explain how they process terabytes of genetic data, train and deploy AI models, and create user-friendly interfaces for their lab scientists. This fascinating conversation reveals how cloud computing and artificial intelligence are revolutionizing biotechnology and potentially helping solve one of this century's biggest health challenges.

With András Asbóth, Bioinformatician / Cloud Dev, Phagos ; With Andrea Di Gioacchino, Head of data, Phagos

Phagos

NextFlow