Amazon Marries Cloud, Mobile Apps With Android, iOS SDKs

Amazon Web Services mobile applications and services

The AWS SDKs for Android and iOS exited beta testing this week. According to Amazon, the SDKs enable developers to make API requests directly from their mobile applications to Amazon's lineup of cloud computing services.

Mobile integration is possible for AWS's flagship cloud services, Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) and Simple Storage Service (S3), and also for other cloud services such as SimpleDB database, Auto Scaling, Elastic Load Balancing and Amazon CloudWatch. Meanwhile, mobile applications can be integrated with Simple Notification Service (SNS), Simple E-mail Service and Simple Queue Service (SQS) to send messages from the apps.

"AWS mobile SDKs make it easier for software developers to call an AWS web service API directly from a mobile application," Amazon said in a statement.

Amazon said mobile developers can use the SDKs to build a host of apps. Some examples include a mobile app that uploads video, photos and other content to Amazon S3 for distribution through Amazon CloudFront; a social game that shares moves, high scores and other data between devices using Amazon SimpleDB; and a messaging client that broadcasts messages between devices using Amazon SQS and Amazon SNS without the need for additional server infrastructure.

Along with the existing beta, Amazon added temporary security credential support fsrom the AWS Security Token Service to the SDKs for Android and iOS for added security.

"Until now, your AWS credentials would have to be stored on the device," wrote AWS Evangelist Jeff Barr in a blog post about the enhanced credential management in Amazon's Android and iOS SDKs. "If your credentials are embedded in a mobile application there is no straightforward way to rotate them without updating every installed copy of the application. Alternatively, each installed copy of the application could require entry of an individual set of AWS credentials. This option would add some friction to the installation process."

The SDKs now include support for temporary security credentials from the AWS Security Token Service.

Amazon's SDKs for Android and iOS are the latest in a recent push by cloud companies toward mobile app development. Recently, Salesforce.com unveiled a new service through Force.com called touch.salesforce.com to enable mobile developers to build applications designed specifically for touch-screen devices.