Welcome to above the clouds

AWS – Amazon RDS for SQL Server supports minor versions 2014 GDR, 2016 GDR, 2017 CU31 GDR, and 2019 CU20
New minor versions of Microsoft SQL Server are now available on Amazon RDS for SQL Server, offering performance and security fixes. Amazon RDS for SQL Server supports the new minor versions for SQL Server 2014, 2016, 2017, and 2019 on the Express, Web, Standard, and Enterprise Editions. Read More for the details.

AWS – Announcing the AWS Amplify UI Builder Figma plugin
AWS Amplify announces the UI Builder Figma plugin, empowering design and development teams to seamlessly collaborate within a Figma file. Use this plugin with the Amplify UI kit to easily theme your components, upgrade to new UI kit versions, and generate and preview React code from your designs directly in Figma. Read More for the […]

AWS – Amazon Connect reduces toll free rates for Australia and New Zealand
Amazon Connect has reduced prices for Toll Free (TFN) rates for Australia and New Zealand in the Asia Pacific (Sydney) region. This includes reductions of Australia TFN inbound minutes by 54% from $0.0540/min to $0.025/min and New Zealand TFN inbound minutes by 52% from $0.2205/min to $0.1069/min. Read More for the details.

GCP – What’s new in Assured Workloads: Region expansion, TLS version restrictions, new supported services
To maximize the benefits of digital transformation, organizations need to be comfortable bringing sensitive and regulated workloads to the cloud. Assured Workloads is a modern cloud solution that allows our customers to run regulated workloads in many of Google Cloud’s global regions. Core to our strategy for Assured Workloads is to build security and compliance […]

GCP – Build better budgets using folders and organizations
TL;DR – Google Cloud budgets are now easier to customize, allowing you to scope costs by folders or organizations instead of the entire billing account or choosing specific projects. The best way to keep an eye on your Google Cloud costs is by creating budgets. We’ve written about what budgets are and how to create […]

GCP – How Wipro models cloud transformation excellence with SAP on Google Cloud
Wipro drives rapid growth and business transformation with SAP on Google Cloud Wipro Limited, a global technology services and consulting firm with more than 250,000 employees, is committed to continually transforming its business to best serve client needs today and in the future. The company launched key cloud migration initiatives as a part of its […]

GCP – State agencies deliver needed services with help from Speridian and Google Cloud
Agencies at all levels of government are looking to technology in order to scale their efforts, respond quickly and provide critical services to the community. When $10B was allocated to the Homeowner Assistance Fund (HAF) as part of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) local state agencies needed to act quickly to assist […]

Azure – General Availability: Azure Sphere version 23.05
The Azure Sphere version 23.05 release includes various new features and developer resources. Read More for the details.

AWS – AWS Elemental MediaConvert releases bandwidth reduction filter for HEVC and AVC
Today, AWS announces the general availability of bandwidth reduction filtering for the AVC and HEVC encoders in AWS Elemental MediaConvert. The bandwidth reduction filter is a perceptual input preprocessing filter which removes temporal noise from video sources while minimizing impact on visual quality. The filter uses human vision system models to reduce imperceptible signals and […]
AWS – AWS Lambda supports starting from timestamp for Kafka event sources
AWS Lambda now supports starting from a specific timestamp when using Amazon Managed Streaming for Apache Kafka (MSK) or Self-Managed Kafka as an event source. Previously, Kafka event source mappings could only have starting positions of trim horizon or latest. Now with starting from a timestamp, you can start processing messages at a precise point […]