AWS Lambda – Coding Without Infrastructure
Last month, at the BTI360 Orange Slice, Richard taught us how to speak AWS. This month, with some assistance from Alexa and the Amazon Echo, we will walk through how to code without infrastructure using AWS Lambda.
AWS Lambda is a new way of thinking about application development and deployment. It’s a serverless environment that let’s you focus on your code without worrying about the hassle of deploying to the cloud. We have included both the video and the slides, as well as a few main takeaways below the video to help you learn more about AWS Lambda, a powerful tool in the AWS echo system.
Video: AWS Lambda Coding Without Infrastructure
If you want to see the entire presentation, click on the slides below.
Why Use AWS Lambda?
Industry leaders are starting to use Lambda. Companies like Netflix, CapitalOne, MLB, Amazon, and Nordstrom are all using Lambda for several compelling reasons.
1. AWS Lambda is Simple
Lambda makes developers lives easier because it lets you focus on the code – the problem you’re actually trying to solve. Spending more time managing your infrastructure rather than writing code? Perhaps you should try Lambda. With no infrastructure to manage, developers can get back to what we love, writing code.
Lambda also forces you to break your application down into smaller pieces which makes it easier to manage throughout the software life-cycle. With Lambda you can also have rapid updates and deployments, as well as, easy rapid integration with any number of partners.
2. AWS Lambda is Scalable
Every function you write automatically scales on demand based on the number of events it receives. With Lambda there’s also zero configuration, zero instances (no servers to scale up or down), and parallel execution. It runs in real-time and can handle billions of events.
So now that we have all the developers reading this hooked, how do you convince management that AWS Lambda is right for them? Lead with the fact that it’s affordable!
3. AWS Lambda is Affordable
You only pay for the time your code executes every 100ms based on the amount of memory you use. And then there’s a small charge for every million function calls. Lambda also has a free tier, but unlike EC2, it doesn’t expire after a year.
You can learn more specifics about Lambda’s free tier as well as see a comparison between Lambda and EC2 in our above video. And while the benefits of using Lambda are substantial, there are a few limitations that we also walk through during the presentation.
So what might you use AWS Lambda for?
Once you weigh the pros and cons, consider a few of the following ways that you could use Lambda:
- Amazon Echo
- Small services like authentication and authorization
- Log processing
- Infrastructure management
- ETL and Streaming Data Processing
- Microservices
Each of these examples are really just part of an emerging trend in application design called Event Driven Architecture. And Event Driven Architecture is what AWS Lambda excels at!
So how do you get started with AWS Lambda?
First, decide how your function is going to get triggered. Lambda integrates with several Amazon services already like API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3, and IoT. Then decide what language you’d like to use – Lambda supports Java, Python, and NodeJS. Lastly, write your function, upload it, and your Lambda function is live!
We hope you enjoy coding in AWS Lambda as much as we do. Best of luck!