Karl Robinson
Karl Robinson

December 2, 2021

Karl is CEO and Co-Founder of Logicata – he’s an AWS Community Builder in the Cloud Operations category, and AWS Certified to Solutions Architect Professional level. Knowledgeable, informal, and approachable, Karl has founded, grown, and sold internet and cloud-hosting companies.

Today it was the turn of AWS CTO Dr. Werner Vogels to deliver his re:Invent keynote.  A slightly more sober warm up act today with the Cattus quartet playing strings covers of modern hits.

Cattus Quartet

In his opening movie, Road to re:Invent, Werner recapped the last 10 years of re:Invent announcements. Dressed in a Stranglers t-shirt, over the course of the next 2 hours he went on to make these 9 new announcements.

1. Amazon EC2 M1 Mac Instances

Amazon EC2 M1 Mac Instances

Werner’s first announcement was the launch into preview of the new Amazon EC2 M1 Mac instances, featuring the new Apple M1 chip, which help developers to build, test and sign Apple apps on Amazon EC2.

2. 30 New AWS Local Zones in 2022

30 New AWS Local Zones

To continue to drive down network latency, AWS will be launching 30 new AWS Local Zones starting in 2022, including Werner’s home city of Amsterdam.  Currently there are 13 live Local Zones across the US, with many more coming across the globe.

3. AWS Cloud WAN

AWS CloudWAN

AWS Cloud WAN was launched into preview today, enabling AWS customers to create global wide area networks in minutes.  Customers can aggregate VPN and Direct Connect connections into a single software defined WAN, all managed and monitored via the AWS console.

4. AWS Amplify Studio

AWS Amplify Studio

AWS Amplify Studio was launched into preview today.  This new tool enables front end developers to vidually build complete feature rich apps in hours instead of weeks, with full control over the application code.  Amplify Studio built apps have scale and security built in – developers don’t need to worry about scaling and securing the application back end.  User interface designs can be imported directly from popular UI design tool Figma.

5. New AWS SDKs for Swift, Kotlin & Rust

AWS SDKs for Swift, Kotlin & Rust

In line with the AWS aim to meet developers where they are, Werner announced 3 new software development kits in preview today, for Swift, Rust and Kotlin.

6. AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK) V2

AWS Cloud Development Kit V2

Version 2 of the popular AWS Cloud Development kit was launched into preview today.  CDK V2 offers 1 package for all stable AWS CDK libraries.  It also includes CDK Watch, and changes to how AWS handles experimental classes, methods and properties.

7. Construct Hub

Construct Hub

AWS Construct Hub was launched into general availability today, helping developers to find and use open source Cloud Development Kit libraries.

8. AWS Well Architected Sustainability Pillar

AWS Well Architected Sustainability Pillar

Werner went on to announce a new 6th pillar in the AWS Well Architected Framework – the Sustainability Pillar.  Sustainability has been a key theme throughout re:Invent 2021 – this new pillar will enable AWS customers to learn, measure and improve their workloads using environmental practises for cloud computing.

9. AWS re:Post

AWS re:Post

AWS re:Post is a community driver question and answer site to help AWS customers remove technical roadblocks from their cloud transformation initiatives.

Conclusion

So there you have it – that’s a wrap for re:Invent 2021 keynotes. AWS now boasts over 200 services, which can cause a lot of confusion.  According to Werner, that’s ‘your fault’! You being the AWS customer of course – AWS is very customer lead so have only built services that their customers have asked for.

If you’d like to discuss how you can leverage AWS services to accelerate your digital transformation, please don’t hesitate to contact Logicata to arrange a no obligation discovery call.