LogiCast AWS News: Free Tier Overhaul, New Cloud Ops Certification, AI Coding Assistant, and More

In the latest episode of LogiCast, the AWS News podcast, host Karl Robinson and co-host Jon Goodall from Logicata were joined by special guest Niklas Westerstråhle, an AWS Community Builder and Ambassador. The panel discussed several important AWS updates and industry news.

AWS Free Tier Gets a Major Overhaul

One of the most significant announcements discussed was the recent overhaul of the AWS Free Tier. As of July 15th, 2023, AWS has introduced a new structure for its free offerings to new account sign-ups. Jon explained the changes:

“The previous way free tier works was you had some always free stuff, that’s not changing. Then there was some free for 12 months stuff. What it looks like now is slightly different.”

The new system offers:

1. A free option and a paid option when signing up for a new account

2. Up to $200 in credits for the free option:

– $100 upfront

– Additional $100 by completing 5 tasks (e.g., launching an EC2 instance, starting a database, building a Lambda function)

3. The free account lasts for 6 months

4. After 6 months, the account is automatically closed unless upgraded to a paid account

Niklas added, “I think it’s a good twist. I love gamified learning, so this is kind of forcing you to do the same.”

Jon emphasized that this change is “an admission from AWS that their old way of doing things didn’t work” and is “much more developer friendly.”

New Name for Cloud Operations Certification

AWS announced an update to the Certified SysOps Administrator certification, renaming it to AWS Certified Cloud Ops Engineer. This change will take effect in September 2025.

Niklas, who holds all AWS certifications, shared his thoughts: “The cloud engineer makes kind of more sense, but as someone who has all the certifications, it’s really annoying how they’re changing it.”

He explained that current SysOps Administrator certificate holders will need to take the new exam to earn the Cloud Ops Engineer certification, even if they hold the DevOps Engineer Professional certification, which previously recertified the SysOps Administrator automatically.

AWS Launches Kiro AI Coding Assistant

Jon added that while exam refreshes are common, this change seems more significant than usual, possibly due to substantial content updates.

AWS recently introduced Kiro, a new AI coding assistant currently in preview. Niklas, who participated in the closed beta, shared his experience:

“It’s a fork from Visual Studio, so it kind of feels familiar for a lot of people. It will create you more than your white coding type of setup; it will give you requirements, the design document, and the tasks.”

He also mentioned that AWS is running a competition with prizes totaling $100,000 for developers who create innovative projects using Kiro.

Jon, while not having used Kiro himself, noted that he uses AI for tasks like line completion and quick reference in his day-to-day work.

AWS Organizations Misconfigured Managed Policy Vulnerability

The panel discussed a recently discovered vulnerability in an AWS managed policy that could potentially allow hackers to take full AWS organizational control. Jon explained:

“In this particular case, there was an improperly scoped permission within the managed policy that grants the registered delegated administrator action, but you could do it with unrestricted resource access.”

AWS has since fixed the issue by creating a new version of the policy (Amazon GuardDuty Full Access) with stricter resource constraints. Niklas pointed out that AWS created a new policy with “_V2” appended to the name, rather than updating the existing policy.

Both experts emphasized the importance of reviewing and updating any roles using the old policy to ensure security.

AWS Layoffs Affecting Hundreds of Jobs

The podcast concluded with a brief discussion on recent news about AWS layoffs. While reports suggest hundreds of jobs are being cut, the panel cautioned against overreacting to these numbers.

Niklas noted, “If Amazon employs 1.6 million people, which sounds like an insane amount of people, then if you’re cutting hundreds of jobs, even if you’re cutting thousands of jobs, it’s a tiny amount of people.”

Jon criticized the reporting, pointing out that the article conflated Amazon’s overall employee count with AWS-specific numbers, potentially misrepresenting the scale of the layoffs within AWS.

In conclusion, this episode of LogiCast covered significant updates in AWS certifications, free tier offerings, AI tools, and security, providing valuable insights for AWS professionals and enthusiasts alike.

This is an AI generated piece of content, based on the Logicast Podcast Season 4 Episode 29.