Da-dum…da-dum…da-dum da-dum da-dum da-dum… It’s JAWS, the combined JavaScript + Amazon Web Services stack surfacing in a great white way on GitHub this week.
JAWS is a “monstrously scalable,” server-free Web application boilerplate using bleeding-edge AWS services. The stack provides new AWS tools for developers to build large scalable Web applications in JavaScript.
The stack includes its own command-line interface to test and deploy API Lambda functions locally, and includes a library module for code reusability. The JAWS back end is comprised entirely of Lambda functions.
According to its GitHub repository, this week’s open-source project of the week has a specific set of goals:
- Use No Servers: JAWS eliminates the need to scale, deploy, maintain and monitor servers.
- Isolated Components: Developers can develop, update or configure each Lambda function separately without affecting any other part of an application. Only individual API routes can go down, not an entire app.
- Scale Infinitely: Lambda back-end features concurrency and the option to enable multi-region redundancy for massive scaling.
- Be Cheap as Possible: Lambda functions run only when they are called, and developers only pay for when they are run.
The JAWS stack features technologies like Node.js and jQuery on the JavaScript side, and DynamoDB, Lambda, API Gateway and Amazon S3 on the AWS side, along with JSON Web Tokens.
Servant, the open-source application and database-tooling provider that gave JAWS life, has also laid out a road map for the stack’s open-source development. Plans include:
- Incorporating the AWS API Gateway Swagger Import Tool
- Writing swagger.json for current API functions
- Adding Swagger import commands to the CLI
- Modifying the site to use API Routes post-deployment
- Writing a JAWS CLI command to build and deploy site assets
- Writing more API examples
A diagram breaking down the JAWS stack’s architecture is available below:
Top 5 projects trending on GitHub this week
#1: JAWS!
#2: Free Code Camp has been featured in the Top 5 for a while now.
#3: Awesome-Selfhosted is a list of free software network services and Web applications that can be hosted locally rather than renting application hosting space from SaaS providers.
#4: Mycli, a terminal client for MySQL with auto-completion and syntax-highlighting functionality.
#5: Streama, a self-hosted “digital bookshelf” billed by its developer as “your own personal Netflix,” complete with a dashboard, streaming video player and admin panel.
