AWS Podcast

This week Simon interviews Jon Handler, Principal Solution Architect, about the Amazon ElasticSearch service. We discuss use cases, tips and tricks and how to best size and scale for different kinds of workloads. https://aws.amazon.com/elasticsearch-service/

In this episode Simon talks about in-memory databases with Darin Briskman, Developer Outreach at AWS. They discuss these types of database in general and, in particular, using Redis to make your system faster, some of the choices you need to make, and how Amazon ElastiCache can help. https://aws.amazon.com/elasticache/

Simon recaps a raft of updates you might have missed including some major updates to EMR, as well as a host of nifty changes in Amazon Machine Learning, AWS IoT and VPC just to name a few! Shownote Links: https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/08/amazon-rds-now-supports-se2-license-included/ http://docs.aws.amazon.com/lumberyard/latest/releasenotes/lumberyard-v1.4.html https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/amazon-cloudfront-expands-to-canada/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/08/compute-and-completion-time-for-object-creation-now-available-in-the-amazon-ml-api-console-and-aws-sdks/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/07/announcing-dns-resolution-support-for-vpc-peering/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/08/amazon-elasticache-now-supports-the-m4-node-family/ http://blogs.aws.amazon.com/security/post/Tx3GL3IZE3FIGB6/Enable-Your-Federated-Users-to-Work-in-the-AWS-Management-Console-for-up-to-12-H https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/08/aws-iot-announces-support-for-just-in-time-registration-of-device-certificates/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/07/aws-iot-announces-support-for-thing-types-in-the-thing-registry/ https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2016/07/aws-codecommit-adds-commit-history-view/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/amazon-emr-5-0-0-major-app-updates-ui-improvements-better-debugging-and-more/

This week Simon explores a raft of new features in services including S3, Kinesis, EBS, KMS to name a few, plus the new Application Load Balancer. Also a nifty set of "black belt" tips when using Node.js with Lambda. Shownote Links: https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/aws-snowball-update-job-management-api-s3-adapter/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/new-bring-your-own-keys-with-aws-key-management-service/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/now-available-ipv6-support-for-amazon-s3/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/new-usage-plans-for-amazon-api-gateway/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/amazon-kinesis-analytics-process-streaming-data-in-real-time-with-sql/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/new-aws-application-load-balancer/ https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/amazon-elastic-block-store-ebs-update-snapshot-price-reduction-more-piopsgib/

In this episode Simon has a conversation with Vibhor Rastogi who is an Investment Director at Intel Capital. Often there are questions as to what VCs are looking for in Startups, and conversely, what Startups should be looking for in VCs. Many startups use AWS as an efficient, low-cost and scalable platform to try out their ideas, with the ability to scale when they are successful. We discuss some of the nuances of the VC space, what VCs are looking for and how Intel Capital looks to invest in these types of businesses. As many of our listeners are running their own startup - we hope this is of real use! Statements in this document that refer to Intel’s plans and expectations for the quarter, the year, and the future, are forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. A detailed discussion of the factors that could affect Intel’s results and plans is included in Intel’s SEC filings, including the annual report on Form 10-K. Intel and the Intel logo are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

In this week’s episode, Simon wants to save you money! You might have heard about Amazon EC2 Spot Instances in the past. Maybe you even played with them a little. The capability has come a LONG way with new and interesting features that let customers reduce operating costs by up to 50-90%! We discuss things like Sport Fleet, Instance Termination Notification and a new Jenkins Plugin that uses Spot!

Keeping your systems secure is a constant effort, and should be a key focus. Fortunately we have more and more automation available at all points of the system development and deployment lifecycle. In this episode we take a look at the Amazon Inspector service and how it can automate security checking of your EC2 instances.

The world of Scientific Computing has been revolutionised by the Cloud. This week Simon speaks with Adrian White from the Scientific Computing team about how HPC and Scientific Computing has been transformed. Lots more information at http://aws.amazon.com/government-education/scientific-computing/.

This week we explore the new Amazon Elastic File System and Elastic Network Adaptor. There is also a tip on some great free security-related training as well as some very cool updates to Amazon SNS!

In this episode we look again at EC2 instance types, and how by reviewing your application metrics and uses against the latest-generation instances available, you can save money and improve performance.