Amazon Cloud Technology's March 2022 New Services and New Features Are Coming

From infrastructure technologies such as computing, storage and databases, to emerging technologies such as machine learning, artificial intelligence, data lakes and analytics, and the Internet of Things, Amazon Cloud Technologies provides customers with a wide range of services and capabilities. With Amazon Cloud, you can build and innovate with a wide variety of cutting-edge technologies to choose from the services and capabilities for your workloads.

In the past March, 40 new functions or new services have been launched in the Amazon Cloud Technology China (Ningxia) region operated by NWCD. We will continue to accelerate the pace of innovation based on customer needs and improve customer experience.

Heavy service

• Amazon EC2 Spot Placement Score , which can recommend suitable Availability Zones based on customer Spot capacity needs.
• Amazon RDS and Amazon Aurora support T4g database instances.
• Amazon Lambda supports Amazon MSK and self-built ApacheKafka as event sources.
• Amazon S3 supports the use of customer-defined checksum algorithms to speed up request integrity checks.
• Amazon Organizations now allows users to close accounts centrally through the console and API/SDK.

calculate

• Amazon EC2 Spot Placement Score

March 17, 2022

The Amazon EC2 Spot Placement Score can help you find the right Availability Zone and instance type choices for your Spot workloads. Availability of Spot Instances varies by instance type, time of day, and Availability Zone. This feature can recommend an Availability Zone based on your Spot capacity needs. You can also test different combinations of instance types to find one that is right for your workload and get the capacity you need.

• Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling Introduces Instance Lifecycle States

March 28, 2022

With this new feature, you can easily trigger actions on instances as they transition from one lifecycle state to another. Instances in an Auto Scaling group transition through various lifecycle states, from when they are launched and put into service to when they are removed from service and terminated. By polling IMDS, you can set up an application on an instance to easily determine its lifecycle state without having to set up Amazon CloudWatch Events or other services.

analyze

• EMR Notebooks has now been upgraded to JupyterLab v3.1.4

March 1, 2022

EMR Notebooks is a hosted JupyterNotebook-based environment that enables data scientists, analysts, and developers to use EMR clusters to prepare and visualize data, collaborate with colleagues, build applications, and perform interactive analysis. EMR Notebooks has now been upgraded to JupyterLab v3.1.4, giving you a better user experience and new ease-of-use features.

• Amazon MSK Enhances Support for Amazon CloudFormation

March 2, 2022

You can use Amazon CloudFormation to manage your Amazon ManagedStreaming for Apache Kafka (MSK) cluster configuration and SASL/SCRAM keys. Amazon MSK is a fully managed service for Apache Kafka that is fully compatible with Apache Kafka. Helps you more easily build and run applications that use Apache Kafka as a data store.

storage

• Amazon S3 supports the use of customer-defined checksum algorithms to speed up request integrity checks

March 1, 2022

Amazon S3 now supports the use of customer-defined checksum algorithms to speed up request integrity checking. You can choose from four checksum algorithms (SHA-1, SHA-256, CRC-32, and CRC-32C) to perform data integrity checks on upload and download requests. Additionally, Amazon SDK and S3 API enhancements improve client-side checksum efficiency, which improves performance and reduces the cost of data validation. You can automatically calculate and validate checksums when storing or retrieving data through S3, and you can access checksum information at any time using the new S3 API or S3 Inventory Reports.

container

• As of Kubernetes 1.21, Windows supports the Containerd runtime on Amazon EKS

March 14, 2022

Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) now supports the Containerd container runtime on Windows Worker nodes. Containerd is a lightweight container runtime that manages the entire container lifecycle on its host system, from container image delivery to execution, as well as storage and networking. Customers with Windows workloads can now get similar performance, security and stability benefits from Containerd offered to such customers compared to customers running Linux-based Worker nodes. With the latest EKS-optimized AMI for Windows, customers with Windows workloads can now realize the benefits of the Containerd runtime. Using the same container runtime across all of your organization's workloads can help reduce the operational effort required to determine the appropriate different runtimes for your workloads. Compared to the Docker runtime, Containerd has a smaller scope and in addition to freeing up more CPU and memory for applications to use, it also helps improve security and reduce pod startup latency.

• Amazon ECS increases service quota for container instances per cluster to 5,000

March 31, 2022

Amazon ECS increased the default service quota for container instances per cluster from 2,000 to 5,000 instances. The increased limit allows customers to further scale and improve the manageability of their clusters.

database

• Amazon RDS for Oracle now supports the October 2021 Patch Set Update (PSU)

March 3, 2022

Amazon RDS for Oracle already supports the October 2021 Patch Set Update (PSU) for Oracle Database 12.1. The October 2021 Release Update (RU) for Oracle Database 12.2 and 19c has been released. Oracle PSUs contain bug fixes and other important security updates.

• Amazon Keyspaces now supports the Amazon SDK software development kit

March 3, 2022

You can now use the Amazon SDK SDK to help you automate resource management at no additional cost to enable the Amazon SDK. Amazon Keyspaces (for Apache Cassandra) is a fully managed database service that is scalable, highly available, and compatible with Apache Cassandra.

• Amazon RDS for MariaDB supports new minor versions 10.6.7, 10.5.15, 10.4.24, 10.3.34, and 10.2.43

March 4, 2022

Amazon RDS for MariaDB now supports MariaDB minor versions 10.6.7, 10.5.15, 10.4.24, 10.3.34, and 10.2.43.

• Amazon RDS for Oracle now supports Oracle Database 21c

March 8, 2022

Oracle Database 21c is the latest innovation and only supports container architecture. You can now launch an RDS instance for Oracle Database 21c from the Amazon RDS Management Console. Use the Start Database Instance wizard and select the database engine version starting with "Oracle 21.0.0.0.*". Amazon RDS for Oracle supports major version upgrades from 19c CDB to 21c.

• Amazon DynamoDB now supports the Limit request option for PartiQL operations

March 8, 2022

Amazon DynamoDB now supports an optional parameter on each request to limit the number of items processed in a PartiQL operation. PartiQL is a SQL-compatible query language that you can execute PartiQL statements to query, insert, update, or delete data in DynamoDB tables. You can now use the Limit request option to control the number of items processed. Using the Limit request option can reduce costs and shorten the duration of each request when you know you need less than a certain number of items.

• Amazon DynamoDB default service quota increased from 256 to 2,500

March 9, 2022

Amazon DynamoDB provides default service quotas to simplify the use of large numbers of tables. DynamoDB will increase the quota for the number of DynamoDB tables you allow to create and manage per Amazon Cloud Technology account and in the Amazon Cloud Technology China (Ningxia) region operated by NWCD from 256 to 2,500. Additionally, DynamoDB increases the number of table management operations you can perform in parallel from 50 to 500.

• Amazon RDS for MySQL now supports new minor versions 5.7.37 and 8.0.28

March 11, 2022

Following the release of updates in MySQL Database versions 5.7 and 8.0, we have updated Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) for MySQL to support MySQL minor versions 5.7.37 and 8.0.28.

• Amazon RDS now supports T4g DB instances

March 18, 2022

Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS) now supports Amazon Graviton2-based T4g database instances for MySQL, MariaDB, and PostgreSQL databases. Compared to the current generation of x86-based T3 DB instances, T4g DB instances offer up to 36% better price/performance (depending on workload characteristics). Amazon RDS T4g DB instances are available in 6 sizes up to 8 vCPUs and 32GiB of memory.

• Amazon Aurora now supports T4g DB instances

March 18, 2022

Amazon Aurora T4g-based DB Instances The Graviton2 T4g DB Instances achieved up to 49% performance improvement over their current-generation x86-based equivalent DB Instances.

• Amazon RDS for Oracle now supports Oracle Native Network Encryption (NNE)

March 23, 2022

Amazon RDS for Oracle supports two new customer-modifiable sqlnet.ora parameters for the OracleNative Network Encryption (NNE) option. This feature allows customers to prevent SQL*NET encryption and checksum parameters from using older ciphers and algorithms. You can configure the SQLNET.ALLOW_WEAK_CRYPTO_CLIENTS parameter to allow or deny outgoing client connections with non-secure ciphers SQLNET.ALLOW_WEAK_CRYPTO parameter to use non-secure ciphers such as DES, 3DES, RC4, etc. and insecure checksum algorithms on the client side ( such as MD5) to allow or deny incoming connections.

• Amazon RDS supports billing for storage, IOPS, and backup capabilities

March 23, 2022

Amazon Cost Explorer and Cost andUsage Reports (CUR) now provide more detailed billing for Amazon RDS charges. In Amazon Cost Explorer, you can use these details to configure granular views and more accurately quantify spend across different RDS database engine types.

• Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL now supports the mysql_fdw extension for Amazon Aurora, MySQL, and MariaDB

March 28, 2022

mysql_fdw is an extension to PostgreSQL that provides a foreign data wrapper for easy and efficient access to Amazon Aurora MySQL-compatible MySQL and MariaDB databases.

• Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL now supports the tds_fdw extension for Amazon Aurora, MySQL, and MariaDB databases

March 28, 2022

This extension allows you to connect a PostgreSQL database to a separate SQL Server database and retrieve the data stored there.

• Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL supports PostgreSQL minor versions 14.2, 13.6, 12.10, 11.15, and 10.20

March 28, 2022

Amazon Relational Database Service (AmazonRDS) for PostgreSQL now supports PostgreSQL minor versions 14.2, 13.6, 12.10, 11.15, and 10.20.

• Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL supports foreign data wrappers for Microsoft SQL Server and Sybase databases

March 31, 2022

Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL Compatible Edition now supports foreign data wrappers that connect to databases that use the Tabular Data Streaming (TDS) protocol, such as Sybase databases and Microsoft SQL Server. You can use this foreign data wrapper to connect to data sources in other databases without duplicating the data.

serverless

• Amazon Lambda now supports Amazon MSK as an event source

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda now supports Amazon Managed Streaming for Apache Kafka (Amazon MSK) as an event source, giving customers more options for building streaming data serverless applications. This feature is available at no additional cost, you only pay for the Lambda invocation triggered by the Apache Kafka topic. Customers can now also use Amazon MSK to build applications triggered from Apache Kafka topics. Can batch messages up to 10,000 records, which may contain messages from one or more partitions, with a maximum payload size of 6MB. Messages within a partition are always processed sequentially.

• Amazon Lambda now supports self-built Apache Kafka as an event source

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda now allows customers to build applications that can be triggered by messages in Apache Kafka clusters hosted on any infrastructure. Customers can keep their existing Apache Kafka clusters intact and use Lambda to quickly and easily build Kafka consumer applications without having to worry about provisioning or managing servers.

• Amazon Lambda now supports SASL/PLAIN authentication for executing self-built Apache Kafka-triggered functions

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda functions triggered from self-built Apache Kafka topics can now use SASL/PLAIN to access usernames and passwords protected by Amazon Secrets Manager at no additional cost. SASL/PLAIN is a simple username/password authentication mechanism that is typically encrypted in conjunction with TLS for secure authentication, and complements SASL/SCRAM.

• Amazon Lambda now supports IAM authentication for Amazon MSK as an event source

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda functions triggered from Amazon MSK topics can now access MSK clusters protected by IAM access control. This is in addition to SASL/SCRAM. If customers choose to use MSK as the event source for their Lambda functions, they can start using this feature without additional cost by simply configuring their function's execution role to allow Lambda to connect to their cluster and read their topics cost of.

• Amazon Lambda now introduces the OffsetLag metric for monitoring Kafka performance

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda now introduces a new metric, OffsetLag, for monitoring the performance of Amazon MSK and self-managed Kafka at no additional cost. The OffsetLag metric measures the total number of messages in the message queue waiting to be sent to the target Lambda function. This gives users a clear view of data congestion in message queues, allowing developers to monitor the performance of events, set alerts and thresholds to check for harmful congestion, and quickly diagnose and resolve inefficiencies in the data flow.

• Amazon Lambda now supports Amazon MQ for Apache ActiveMQ as an event source

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda now supports AmazonMQ for Apache ActiveMQ as an event source, giving customers more choice in messaging services for serverless applications. Amazon MQ is a managed message broker service for Apache ActiveMQ that makes it easy to set up and operate a message broker in the cloud. Customers can quickly and easily build applications by invoking Lambda functions based on messages published to the Amazon MQ message broker without having to worry about provisioning or managing servers.

• Amazon Lambda adds autoscaling capabilities for Amazon MSK and self-built Apache Kafka event sources

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda introduces improved autoscaling for Amazon MSK and self-managed Kafka as event sources to improve performance and help customers reduce costs. Lambda starts with one consumer, checks the OffsetLag metric (a measure of backlog at the source location) and processing rate every minute, and then scales up or down every 3 minutes. For a Kafka cluster, Lambda allows at most one consumer per partition per topic. Previously, Lambda typically started a connection to a Kafka cluster with a single consumer, then checked the OffsetLag every 15 minutes and scaled (or scaled down) the consumer.

• Amazon Lambda now supports maximum batch window

March 10, 2022

Amazon Lambda now supports the maximum batch window when using Amazon MSK, Apache Kafka, and Amazon MQ for Apache Active MQ as event sources. This is a useful new feature that enables developers to fine-tune Lambda invocations, reducing the number of invocations and optimizing costs. This feature gives you further control over batching behavior when processing data from Amazon MSK, Apache Kafka, and Amazon MQ for Apache Active MQ as event sources. Lambda reads records from the event source stream at a fixed frequency and then invokes a function that contains a batch of records. With the maximum batch window, you only need to wait 300 seconds before calling the function to build the batch. The function is now called whenever one of the following conditions is met: the payload size reaches 6MB, the maximum batch window reaches its maximum value, or the batch size reaches its maximum value. Using the max batch window, you can increase the average number of records passed to the function per call.

• Amazon Lambda adds support for .NET 6

March 23, 2022

When using .NET 6 to create serverless applications in Lambda, developers can take advantage of several new features such as improved logging, simplified function definitions using top-level statements, and improved performance using source code generators. With .NET 6 you can also take advantage of several new .NET language features and performance optimizations.

management tools

• Amazon Compute Optimizer now offers enhanced infrastructure metrics

March 1, 2022

Amazon Compute Optimizer now offers enhanced infrastructure metrics, a feature of a new EC2 Recommendation. When activated, this billing feature can capture monthly or quarterly usage patterns to enhance Amazon EC2 instance and Auto Scaling group recommendations. Compute Optimizer accomplishes this by ingesting and analyzing six times more Amazon CloudWatch usage metrics history (up to 3 months of history vs 14 days) than the default Compute Optimizer option. You can activate this feature at the organization, account, or resource level for all existing and newly created EC2 instances and Auto Scaling groups through the Compute Optimizer console or API.

• Amazon Compute Optimizer now provides resource efficiency metrics

March 1, 2022

Amazon Compute Optimizer can help you quickly identify and prioritize advanced optimization opportunities (saving opportunities and performance improvement opportunities) through two new sets of dashboard-level metrics. Amazon Compute Optimizer reduces costs and improves performance by analyzing historical utilization metrics using machine learning. Over-provisioning resources can result in unnecessary infrastructure costs, while under-provisioning resources can result in degraded application performance. By applying knowledge gained from Amazon Cloud Technologies' experience running various workloads in the cloud, Amazon Compute Optimizer can identify workload patterns and recommend resource configurations that are more appropriate for your business.

• Amazon CloudWatch Agent Adds Support for NVIDIA GPU Metrics

March 11, 2022

The Amazon CloudWatch agent now supports collecting performance metrics for NVIDIA GPUs in Amazon EC2 accelerated computing instances running Linux. You can use these GPU-accelerated computing instances to accelerate scientific, engineering, and rendering applications. Customers can install and configure the CloudWatch agent to collect system and application metrics from Amazon EC2, localhost, and containerized applications and send them to CloudWatch. You can discover anomalies by using CloudWatch Anomaly Detection and receive notifications through CloudWatch Alarms.

• Amazon CloudWatch agent now supports log filter expressions

March 11, 2022

The Amazon CloudWatch agent adds support for configurable log filter expressions. Customers can install and configure the CloudWatch agent to collect system and application logs from Amazon EC2, localhost, and containerized applications and send them to CloudWatch. This new configuration option is intended for users who only wish to collect log events that meet specified criteria. With this new feature of the CloudWatch agent, you can specify "match" and "exclude" regular expressions for each log stream in the agent configuration file. This lets the agent evaluate each log event against an expression to determine if the log event should be sent to CloudWatch. Log events not sent to CloudWatch are discarded. Log filters help you manage log extraction by processing only log events that meet specified criteria (such as events that contain error codes) or by eliminating verbose log events.

• Amazon CloudWatch agent adds support for configurable log group retention

March 11, 2022

The Amazon CloudWatch agent now allows you to specify how long CloudWatch retains log events. You can install and configure the CloudWatch agent to collect system and application logs from Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), localhost, and containerized applications and send them to CloudWatch. This new configuration option is for users who wish to apply a uniform log group retention period when deploying the agent, you can adjust the retention policy for each log group, continue to use the indefinite retention setting, or choose a value between 10 years and 1 day retention period.

• Amazon Service Catalog now supports VPC endpoint policies

March 18, 2022

With this new support for VPC Endpoint Policies, customers can create or modify their VPC endpoints, interfaces, or gateways, and optionally attach customer-managed policies that specify Service Catalog access.

• Amazon Organizations now allows users to close accounts centrally through the console and API/SDK

March 30, 2022

With this feature, you can close member accounts in Amazon Organizations centrally through the console, or programmatically through the command line interface or SDK. This feature allows you to close member accounts from your organization's administrative account, making it easier and more efficient to manage your own Amazon Cloud workloads, dramatically simplifying how you manage multi-account infrastructure in Amazon Cloud.

Networking and Content Distribution

Amazon VPC now supports assigning IP prefixes to EC2 instances

March 16, 2022

Starting today, customers using Amazon VPC in the Amazon Cloud China (Ningxia) Region, operated by NWCD, can assign IP prefixes to EC2 instances at no additional cost. This feature allows you to assign IPv4 and IPv6 prefixes to EC2 instances, allowing you to scale and simplify the management of containers and networked applications that require multiple IP addresses on the instance. Many container orchestrators require each container workload to have a unique IP address. This feature allows you to assign hundreds or even thousands of IP addresses to your instance, increasing the number of containers that can be hosted in your instance. Assigning prefixes to instances also simplifies VPC management because you can start and terminate containers without orchestrating individual IP assignments. Additionally, assigning IP prefixes to EC2 instances can also help you optimize the cost of running network applications such as virtual firewalls. Before using this feature, to run these applications, you would need to use larger instances to support a higher number of IP addresses. You can now run the same application on a smaller instance because you can use prefixes to assign the same or multiple IP addresses, optimizing costs.

• Amazon App Mesh Envoy Management Service (EMS) now supports Amazon CloudTrail integration

March 18, 2022

With the CloudTrail integration for EMS, customers can now get a history of all API calls made by the Envoy proxy to App Mesh to retrieve dynamic configuration. This allows customers to enhance governance, compliance, and risk auditing of workloads running in Amazon App Mesh.