Ready, Set, Cloud! https://www.readysetcloud.io/ Tech blog, podcast, and newsletter by Allen Helton on modern cloud development, developer experience, and tech leadership. There's a little something for everybody! Zipping 15GB of S3 files in Lambda in 215 seconds https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/218/ You can do a whole lot more in Lambda than you realized with proper memory management. Your agent is repeating itself https://www.readysetcloud.io/blog/allen.helton/your-agent-is-repeating-itself/ So much of agent traffic is repetitive. By adding in caching layers, you can both improve your user experience and decrease your bills in one fell swoop. Agent development has changed... again. https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/217/ In the past two years, tech has seen an incredibly fast cycle on how we build AI agents. Things have changed again, but in a good way. Think again about running agents locally https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/216/ Are you running an AI agent on your dev machine to do work for you? You may have some security issues. Local agents scare me https://www.readysetcloud.io/blog/allen.helton/local-agents-scare-me/ I built an AI agent with its own identity, MFA, and scoped credentials. It's still not safe. Here's why local is the wrong place to run it. Using AI to Create Music https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/215/ Have you ever wanted to create your own music but felt a little overwhelmed? Just use AI! Goodbye, Amazon Q Developer https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/214/ AWS announced end of support for Amazon Q Developer in favor of Kiro. You have another year to make the switch. The Modern Architecture Trinity https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/213/ This week we discuss process intelligence, event-driven architecture, and agentic AI as the foundational pillars of modern architecture. Lessons from 500K Agent Deployments https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/212/ Take it from the people who've done it time and time again - agent development is normalizing with some hard-learned lessons. S3 as a filesystem!? https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/211/ AWS released S3 files, letting you add a layer on top of S3 to treat objects as files. It's about time! Build your own AI film crew https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/210/ We have great content on using AWS to build your own personal film crew to edit videos. Let's get serious about AI agents https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/209/ It's no secret agentic AI has taken over. While there's still much to learn, major optimizations are starting to pop up. Your AI agents are a security nightmare https://www.readysetcloud.io/blog/allen.helton/your-ai-agents-are-a-security-nightmare/ AI agents often run with more access than they should. Here's how moving to session-based identity changed how I design and trust autonomous systems. Is MCP already broken? https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/208/ We all know about MCP. But now the community is asking hard questions about whether it was the right call. The devil's in the details https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/207/ Taking your system from good to great takes attention to detail, not major architectural shifts. Builders are taking their platforms back https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/206/ We're seeing a rise in developers building their own content platforms with custom features. Have you built one yet? Postman might be my new favorite IDE https://www.readysetcloud.io/blog/allen.helton/postman-might-be-my-new-favorite-ide/ AI can generate APIs quickly, but maintaining structure is harder. Here’s how I used Postman to enforce contracts, tests, and CI across the API lifecycle. The future of SaaS https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/205/ Is SaaS dead, or is it stronger than ever? Not everything needs AI - but it helps https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/204/ To use AI or not, that is the question in the early days of 2026. AI agents, benchmarks, and the builders behind them https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/203/ It's a great week for some pragmatic AI development as we dig into how our industry is changing. No more dev docs? https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/202/ We have a wide range of topics from last week ranging from dev docs to monolith event handlers 💔 Sending love to our friends at AWS https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/201/ Another round of layoffs plagued AWS employees last week, leaving 16,000 people without a job. Hooray for 200 issues! https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/200/ Thank you all for sticking with me for 200 issues of the newsletter. Here's to 200 more! The operational state of AI and Cloud https://www.readysetcloud.io/talks/the-operational-state-of-ai-and-cloud/ On Cloud Dialogues, I break down the current operating reality for AI and cloud: regional model limits, data governance blockers, the widening adoption curve, and why reliability and sustainability matter as much as cost. AI in the real world https://www.readysetcloud.io/newsletter/199/ Sci Fi is officially becoming a reality with a clearer understanding of running AI on the edge