External endpoints and testing of task states now available in AWS Step Functions

Now AWS Step Functions HTTPS endpoints let you integrate third-party APIs and external services to your workflows. HTTPS endpoints provide a simpler way of making calls to external APIs and integrating with existing SaaS providers, like Stripe for handling payments, GitHub for code collaboration and repository management, and Salesforce for sales and marketing insights. Before this launch, customers needed to use an AWS Lambda function to call the external endpoint, handling authentication and errors directly from the code. Also, we are announcing a new capability to test your task states individually without the need to deploy or execute the state machine. AWS Step Functions is a visual workflow service that makes it easy for developers to build distributed applications, automate…

Build generative AI apps using AWS Step Functions and Amazon Bedrock

Today we are announcing two new optimized integrations for AWS Step Functions with Amazon Bedrock. Step Functions is a visual workflow service that helps developers build distributed applications, automate processes, orchestrate microservices, and create data and machine learning (ML) pipelines. In September, we made available Amazon Bedrock, the easiest way to build and scale generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications with foundation models (FMs). Bedrock offers a choice of foundation models from leading providers like AI21 Labs, Anthropic, Cohere, Stability AI, and Amazon, along with a broad set of capabilities that customers need to build generative AI applications, while maintaining privacy and security. You can use Amazon Bedrock from the AWS Management Console, AWS Command Line Interface (AWS CLI), or AWS…

New Amazon CloudWatch log class for infrequent access logs at a reduced price

Amazon CloudWatch Logs announces today a new log class called Infrequent Access. This new log class offers a tailored set of capabilities at a lower cost for infrequently accessed logs, enabling customers to consolidate all their logs in one place in a cost-effective manner. As customers’ applications continue to scale and grow, so does the volume of logs generated. To limit the increase of logging costs, many customers are forced to make hard trade-offs. For example, some customers limit the logs generated by their applications, which can hinder the visibility of the application, or choose a different solution for different log types, which adds complexity and inefficiencies in managing different logging solutions. For instance, customers may send logs needed for…

AWS Weekly Roundup—Reserve GPU capacity for short ML workloads, Finch is GA, and more—November 6, 2023

The year is coming to an end, and there are only 50 days until Christmas and 21 days to AWS re:Invent! If you are in Las Vegas, come and say hi to me. I will be around the Serverlesspresso booth most of the time. Last week’s launches Here are some launches that got my attention during the previous week. Amazon EC2 – Amazon EC2 announced Capacity Blocks for ML. This means that you can now reserve GPU compute capacity for your short-duration ML workloads. Learn more about this launch on the feature page and announcement blog post. Finch – Finch is now generally available. Finch is an open source tool for local container development on macOS (using Intel or Apple Silicon).…