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amazon-sqs-java-messaging-lib
This Amazon SQS Java Messaging Library holds the Java Message Service compatible classes, that are used for communicating with Amazon Simple Queue Service.
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serverless-java-container
A Java wrapper to run Spring, Spring Boot, Jersey, and other apps inside AWS Lambda.
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SurveyJS
Open-Source JSON Form Builder to Create Dynamic Forms Right in Your App. With SurveyJS form UI libraries, you can build and style forms in a fully-integrated drag & drop form builder, render them in your JS app, and store form submission data in any backend, inc. PHP, ASP.NET Core, and Node.js.
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Amazon SQS is also known as the Simple Queue Service. Much like people waiting in line for a busy ride at a theme park, sometimes you have places in your application where events may get backed up, creating a bit of a bottleneck and harming your application's performance (and potentially your wallet, too). A queue service such as SQS will help you process and maintain your events and messages as they come in. SQS specifically is what is known as a First-In First-Out or FIFO queue, meaning the first item in is the first item to be processed, just like the first person in line for our ride is the first person to get on. Sometimes with high volumes of messages waiting to be processed, there is risk that they get lost or skipped over in processing (disgruntled individuals leaving the long wait at the theme park ride) - having SQS in place prevents this problem from happening. It also means you do not have to worry about your other services being up and ready to handle incoming events, as SQS manages and stores the messages for you (the fun, roped off queue handles the people waiting and the order in which they arrived at our theme park ride). Just like our other services you can configure SQS, however this is a fairly 'Simple' service, so you'll find creating and maintaining an SQS queue to be uncomplicated.
Although not what I would consider 'core' cloud services, the orchestration and communication services are key to event driven development and robust application design. If you are structuring your application to take advantage of event flow, these are tools you are going to want to be familiar with, and will be instrumental in your success by saving you time, money, complexity, and management overhead. This about wraps up what I want to cover with serverless cloud services, though there is so much out there to explore. Tune in tomorrow as we start to put all of this together with best practices.*
As with most of the AWS resources, you can provision and configure your step function however you choose. For me, this is typically using an Infrastructure as Code tool like CDK to provision in python or typescript, and then defining the actual steps - otherwise known as the 'state machine' - in a JSON file. Since its release in 2016, Step Functions have had a visual component in the AWS Console that allows you to see the steps of your application and the flow of your event through it, but in 2021 AWS released Workflow Studio, which actually allows you to drag and drop the components you want to use into a visual editor, and it will auto-generate the code for you. Unfortunately working in a large enterprise this isn't something I can really take advantage of, but as a visual learner I think this is an awesome tool, and can definitely streamline your development.