All news with #product release tag

Google Cloud Bigtable Adds Tiered Storage for Hot/Cold Data

🔔 Google Cloud previewed Bigtable tiered storage, which automatically moves less-frequently accessed data from high-performance SSD storage to an infrequent access tier while exposing the same Bigtable API. The fully managed feature integrates with Bigtable autoscaling so applications can read and write across hot and cold tiers via a single interface. Google says the infrequent access tier can be up to 85% less expensive than SSD and that a tiered-storage node offers substantially more usable capacity, making it suited for large time-series and telemetry datasets that require long-term retention for analytics or compliance.

Vertex AI Training Expands Large-Scale Training Capabilities

🚀 Vertex AI Training introduces managed features designed for large-scale model development, simplifying cluster provisioning, job orchestration, and resiliency across hundreds to thousands of accelerators. The offering integrates Cluster Director, Dynamic Workload Scheduler, optimized checkpointing, and curated training recipes, including NVIDIA NeMo support. These capabilities reduce operational overhead and accelerate transitions from pretraining to fine-tuning while improving cost and uptime efficiency.

Google: AI Studio Aims to Let Everyone 'Vibe Code' Games

🕹️ Google says its AI Studio will enable users to 'vibe code' simple video games by the end of the year. The company claims the tool can automatically select models and wire up APIs to streamline app creation, while noting current limitations for production-ready systems. Product lead Logan Kilpatrick highlighted the potential to broaden access to game creation, and startups like Cursor are pursuing similar next-generation vibe coding tools.

Amazon Location Service adds granular API key restrictions

🔒 AWS has introduced enhanced API key restrictions for Amazon Location Service to help developers secure location-based applications. Keys can now be bound to specific Android applications using package names and SHA-1 certificate fingerprints, or to iOS apps using Bundle IDs, enabling separate keys for testing and production. The feature is available in multiple AWS Regions and is configurable via the console or APIs. This reduces the risk of key misuse and enforces app-level access control.

Cloudflare Speed Test: Measuring Real-World Internet Quality

⚡ Cloudflare’s Speed Test measures the quality users actually experience rather than peak bandwidth. It sends predefined data blocks via the Network Quality API from the user’s browser to Cloudflare Workers routed by anycast, recording idle and loaded latency, jitter, packet loss, and throughput across sizes. Results appear live and culminate in an AIM score summarizing suitability for streaming, gaming, or conferencing.

Cloudflare Radar's Evolution: Expanding Internet Observability

📡 Since its 2020 debut, Cloudflare Radar has evolved into a comprehensive observability platform that aggregates Cloudflare telemetry to illuminate security, performance, and usage trends. Initially centered on Radar Internet Insights, Domain Insights, and IP Insights, the service has grown to include Certificate Transparency metrics, TCP reset/timeouts visibility, post-quantum adoption tracking, and AI-focused crawler analytics. Radar also added routing tools such as route leak and origin hijack detection, real-time BGP views, AS-SET monitoring, and notifications, while improving programmatic access via the Radar API and an MCP server for LLM integration. Popular utilities like the URL Scanner, expanded search and date-range options, and internationalized interfaces reinforce Radar's mission to make the Internet more observable and resilient.

Amazon ECS Managed Instances Now in All Commercial Regions

🚀 Amazon ECS Managed Instances is now available in all commercial AWS Regions as a fully managed, EC2-based compute option that reduces infrastructure management overhead while retaining the full capabilities of Amazon EC2. Managed Instances dynamically scales EC2 capacity, continuously optimizes task placement, and applies security patching on a 14-day cadence. You specify task requirements such as vCPU, memory, and CPU architecture, and Amazon ECS provisions and operates optimal instances in your account. Management fees apply in addition to regular EC2 charges.

Amazon Redshift Serverless Now in Osaka and Malaysia

🚀 Amazon Redshift Serverless is now generally available in the AWS Asia Pacific (Osaka) and Asia Pacific (Malaysia) regions. It enables data analysts, developers, and data scientists to run and scale analytics without provisioning or managing clusters by automatically provisioning and intelligently scaling compute capacity. You pay per-second for compute and can query data in-place from Amazon S3 (including Apache Parquet), use Redshift data shares, restore provisioned snapshots, or work through the Query Editor V2 or existing BI tools.

SageMaker Unified Studio adds searchable match context

🔍 Amazon SageMaker in Unified Studio now surfaces additional search context that clarifies why each result appears by showing which metadata fields matched a query. Inline highlighting emphasizes matched terms and an explanation panel details matches across name, description, glossary, schema, and other metadata. The enhancement reduces time spent evaluating irrelevant assets by presenting match evidence directly in search results, enabling quicker validation without opening individual assets. The capability is available in all AWS Regions where SageMaker is supported.

Predictive Scaling Now Available in Six More AWS Regions

⚙️ AWS has expanded Predictive Scaling for EC2 Auto Scaling to six additional regions: Asia Pacific (Hyderabad), Asia Pacific (Melbourne), Israel (Tel Aviv), Canada West (Calgary), Europe (Spain), and Europe (Zurich). Predictive Scaling learns from historical patterns and launches instances ahead of anticipated demand to reduce over-provisioning, lower EC2 costs, and keep applications responsive. It complements real-time policies like Target Tracking and Simple Scaling and can be previewed using a "Forecast Only" mode. The feature is available via the console, AWS CLI, CloudFormation, and AWS SDKs.

Amazon VPC Reachability and Network Analyzer Now in GovCloud

🛡️ Amazon has launched VPC Reachability Analyzer and VPC Network Access Analyzer in both AWS GovCloud (US‑West) and GovCloud (US‑East) Regions. These tools let administrators diagnose network reachability between source and destination resources across VPCs and accounts, for example identifying missing route table entries that block EC2-to-EC2 connectivity. Network Access Analyzer finds unintended access paths such as traffic that bypasses firewalls so teams can enforce security and compliance scopes. For pricing and operational details consult the VPC Network Analysis pricing information.

VPC Reachability & Network Access Analyzers Now in GovCloud

🔍 Amazon announced that VPC Reachability Analyzer and VPC Network Access Analyzer are now available in AWS GovCloud (US-West) and AWS GovCloud (US-East). Reachability Analyzer diagnoses network paths between source and destination resources in VPCs to identify misconfigurations such as missing route table entries across accounts. Network Access Analyzer finds unintended access paths by letting you define scopes to ensure traffic traverses required controls, for example verifying web app traffic goes through a firewall. See the product documentation and the Network Analysis section of the Amazon VPC pricing page for details.

Amazon Aurora DSQL Adds Resource-Based Policies Support

🔒 Amazon Web Services has added resource-based policies to Aurora DSQL, letting administrators define which IAM principals can perform specific IAM actions on Aurora DSQL resources. Policies also support Block Public Access (BPA) controls to restrict access to public or VPC endpoints. The capability is available now in a set of regions and the documentation provides guidance to get started.

How Five Agencies Built Impossible Ads with Gemini

🎨 Google showcased how five agencies used Gemini 2.5 Pro and complementary generative media models to produce ambitious ad campaigns that blend nostalgia, personalization, and scalable visual storytelling. Projects ranged from a retro AI radio for Slice to personalized "postcard" ads for Virgin Voyages, AI co-hosts and party themes for Smirnoff, crowdsourced mascots for Visit Orlando, and cinematic short film work with Moncler. Results highlighted rapid production, measurable engagement lifts, and cross-product workflows across Imagen, Veo, Lyria, and Vertex AI. The post invites brands to explore these tools for creative scale and efficiency.

AWS Transfer Family: Change IdP Type Without Downtime

🔁 AWS Transfer Family now lets administrators change a server's identity provider (IdP) type without service interruption. This update allows dynamic switching among service-managed, Active Directory, and custom IdP authentication for SFTP, FTPS, and FTP servers, enabling zero-downtime migrations and faster compliance adaptation. The capability is available in all AWS Regions where Transfer Family operates.

CloudWatch Adds EC2 Metrics for EBS IOPS and Throughput

🔔 Amazon introduced two new Amazon CloudWatch instance-level metrics — Instance EBS IOPS Exceeded Check and Instance EBS Throughput Exceeded Check — that flag when the driven IOPS or throughput exceeds the EBS-Optimized limits of an EC2 instance. Each metric returns 0 (not exceeded) or 1 (exceeded), enabling rapid identification of I/O bottlenecks and the creation of dashboards or alarms. These metrics are provided by default at a 1-minute frequency at no additional charge for Nitro-based EC2 instances with EBS attached and are accessible via the EC2 console, CLI, or CloudWatch API across Commercial, GovCloud (US), and China Regions.

SageMaker Studio Integrates with Athena Workgroups

📊 Data engineers and analysts can now connect Amazon SageMaker Unified Studio to existing Amazon Athena workgroups to run SQL queries using the workgroups' default settings and properties. This lets teams reuse access controls, cost limits, and query-tracking policies already defined in Athena, reducing setup time while maintaining governance. To enable it, choose 'Add compute' → 'Connect to existing compute resources' in Unified Studio; the connected Athena workgroup then appears in the query editor and is available in all regions where Unified Studio is supported.

AWS Lambda ups asynchronous payload limit to 1 MB today

🚀 AWS has increased the maximum payload size for AWS Lambda asynchronous invocations from 256 KB to 1 MB. This change lets customers deliver richer, complex events—such as LLM prompts, telemetry batches, or detailed JSON outputs—without splitting, compressing, or externalizing data. The increase is generally available in all AWS Commercial and AWS GovCloud (US) Regions and can be used via the Lambda invoke API. Billing counts 1 request for the first 256 KB and an additional request per 64 KB chunk beyond that up to 1 MB.

Microsoft Unveils Mico: Copilot Avatar for Empathy

🤖 Microsoft today introduced Mico, a new avatar for its AI-powered Copilot designed to feel more personal, supportive, and empathetic. The optional visual presence listens, adapts its expressions and color to interactions, and will respectfully push back when presented with incorrect information. The Copilot Fall Release also adds features such as Copilot Groups for up to 32 collaborators, long-term memory, Deep Research Proactive Actions, and a Learn Live voice-enabled tutor. These updates begin rolling out in the United States with broader regional availability planned.

Amazon Aurora DSQL Now Available in Frankfurt Region

🚀 Amazon Aurora DSQL is now available in Europe (Frankfurt), expanding AWS’s global footprint for its serverless distributed SQL engine. The managed service provides active-active high availability, multi-Region strong consistency, and automatic, virtually unlimited scaling so teams can build always-on applications without infrastructure management. Aurora DSQL is advertised as offering the fastest distributed SQL reads and writes, and is already available across US, Asia Pacific, and European Regions. Customers can trial it via the AWS Free Tier.