In Season 4, Episode 42, Karl and Jon are joined by AWS Community Builder Sujal Shaw to discuss a range of new AWS developments. Topics include the New AWS Region Planner for easier regional planning and global deployments, EC2 Auto Scaling warm pool support for mixed instance policies, the AWS European Sovereign Cloud white paper, and the new underwater AWS Fastnet cable featuring robust armoring. They also explore the challenges younger developers face when deploying to AWS. The team was delighted to make it through the episode without any gremlins—despite Karl’s makeshift mobile studio setup in Madrid!

04:12 - AWS Region Planner

AWS introduced a new tool for centralized information on service and feature availability across regions. It helps architects avoid feature parity issues between regions and plan global deployments more efficiently. The tool shows availability status (available, planning, not expanding, or planned) for services and features in different regions.

11:34 - EC2 Auto Scaling Warm Pool Support

AWS announced warm pool support for auto scaling groups with mixed instance policies. This feature combines the benefits of warm pools (faster instance launch) with mixed instances (flexibility in instance types). It allows for both speed and cost savings by keeping a mix of pre-warmed instances ready to launch instantly using the most effective combination of on-demand, spot, or savings plan instances.

16:59 - AWS European Sovereign Cloud

AWS published a white paper detailing the upcoming European Sovereign Cloud. It will be operated by EU residents and citizens, with no critical dependencies on non-EU infrastructure. The cloud aims to address data residency and sovereignty concerns for European organizations, particularly government and regulated industries.

25:30 - AWS Fastnet Underwater Cable

Amazon is equipping a new underwater cable (AWS Fastnet) with robust armoring to prevent cuts. The cable will run from Maryland, US to Ireland, capable of transporting over 320 terabytes per second. The armoring aims to protect against potential threats like fishing anchors or intentional damage, improving durability and reducing maintenance downtime.

32:26 - Challenges of Deploying to AWS

Corey Quinn's article discusses the complexity of deploying to AWS, arguing that younger developers may not tolerate the steep learning curve. The article highlights the numerous steps and services (IAM, VPCs, etc.) required before actual development can begin. It suggests that easier deployment options like Vercel or Heroku, which abstract away complexity, may be more appealing to new developers.

In Season 4, Episode 41, Karl and Jon are joined by AWS Community Builder Fabien Zucchet to discuss AWS Lambda’s increased payload size for asynchronous invocations and what it means for developers building event-driven applications. They cover the new metrics dashboard for AWS Step Functions, best practices for handling sensitive log data in Amazon CloudWatch, and insights into a major AWS service outage and its widespread impact. The episode wraps up with a look at Amazon’s stock jump despite recent challenges, as the trio reflect on the resilience of cloud providers in a constantly evolving market. And then the guys joked about how their video call issues were secretly caused by discussing cloud outages, as if the streaming platform was taking revenge.

03:57 - AWS Lambda payload size increase

AWS Lambda increased its maximum payload size from 256KB to 1MB for asynchronous invocations. The speakers discussed potential use cases and pricing implications, noting that while it solves a problem, it may not be widely necessary and could lead to increased costs for some users.

13:21 - AWS Step Functions metrics dashboard

AWS announced a new metrics dashboard for Step Functions. The speakers viewed this as a positive development, improving observability and providing better insights for users, especially those operating at scale.

17:19 - Handling sensitive log data in Amazon Cloudwatch

The article discussed methods for masking sensitive information in Cloudwatch logs. The speakers highlighted the importance of this feature for compliance with regulations like GDPR and protecting personally identifiable information (PII).

23:56 - AWS service outage

A major AWS outage occurred due to a DNS race condition, affecting multiple services. The speakers discussed the complexity of operating at AWS's scale and the cascading effects of the outage on various dependent services.

33:29 - Amazon's stock performance

Despite recent challenges including the service outage and layoffs, Amazon's stock jumped due to accelerated AWS cloud growth. The speakers discussed how layoffs can paradoxically lead to stock increases and the continued strong performance of AWS as a key driver of Amazon's success.

In Season 4, Episode 40, Karl and Jon are joined by AWS Community Builder Jason Wood to discuss the recent AWS outage in the US-East-1 region and its impact across multiple services. They cover simplified model access in Amazon Bedrock, the introduction of the Claude 4.5 Haiku model, the launch of Amazon EC2 Capacity Manager, new automated CloudWatch dashboards for analyzing log usage, and the latest AWS service availability updates, including those entering maintenance or retirement. Eventually, the conversation takes a lighter turn as the guys debate which countries Jon must speak in to officially graduate from a national to international conference speaker.

09:08 - Simplified model access in Amazon Bedrock

AWS has simplified access to non-AWS models in Bedrock, removing the need for manual activation in most cases. This change streamlines the process of using AI models, though some models like Anthropic's still require a first-time usage form.

14:49 - Claude 4.5 Haiku model in Amazon Bedrock

Anthropic has released Claude 4.5 Haiku, a more cost-effective model with performance comparable to the older Sonnet version. The speakers discussed the naming conventions and the importance of upgrading from older models before they reach end-of-life.

18:51 - Amazon EC2 Capacity Manager

This new feature provides a single interface for monitoring, analyzing, and managing EC2 capacity usage. It combines data from various existing tools, offering a comprehensive view of capacity trends, cost optimization opportunities, and usage metrics.

24:15 - Enhanced automatic dashboard for CloudWatch logs

AWS introduced an enhanced automatic dashboard for analyzing CloudWatch log usage. This feature provides detailed insights into log ingestion, API calls, and cost-related metrics, making it easier to optimize log management and associated costs.

30:32 - AWS service availability updates

AWS announced changes to the availability status of several services. 19 services are moving to maintenance mode, and 4 are entering sunset phase. The speakers discussed the implications of these changes and potential alternatives for affected services.