Lambda Serverless

AWS Lambda Serverless

When to Use

• Building event-driven functions with AWS Lambda
• Designing serverless architectures on AWS
• Configuring event source mappings (SQS, DynamoDB Streams, Kinesis)
• Managing Lambda concurrency, cold starts, and provisioned concurrency
• Deploying Lambda@Edge or CloudFront Functions for edge computing
• Preparing for AWS DVA-C02 or SAP-C02 exams

Core Jobs

1. Lambda Triggers (Event Sources)

Push model (API GW, S3, SNS): AWS service invokes Lambda directly. Pull model / Event source mapping (SQS, Kinesis, DynamoDB Streams): Lambda polls the source.

2. Concurrency Management

Account limit: 1,000 concurrent executions per region by default (can request increase). Reserved concurrency = 0: effectively disables the function (throttles all invocations).

Concurrency calculation: concurrency = (requests/second) × (average function duration in seconds) Example: 500 req/s × 0.2s average = 100 concurrent executions needed.

3. Cold Starts

Cold start occurs when:

• No warm execution environment available
• Function not invoked for several minutes (environment recycled)
• Burst traffic exceeds warm environments

Cold start duration by runtime (approximate):

• Java, .NET, Kotlin: 500ms–2s (JVM initialization)
• Python, Node.js, Go, Ruby: 50–200ms (lighter runtimes)
• Custom container: varies (container pull adds overhead)

Cold start mitigations:

1. Provisioned concurrency — pre-initialize environments; eliminates cold starts (costs money continuously)
2. Smaller deployment package — less code to load; faster init
3. Minimize imports/initialization code — move work outside handler to module-level (runs once)
4. SnapStart (Java) — snapshot initialized environment; restore on cold start (sub-100ms for Java)
5. Keep warm (not recommended) — scheduled pings every 5 minutes; not reliable and wasteful

4. Event Source Mapping Configuration

SQS + Lambda:

• Batch size: 1–10,000 messages
• Batch window: 0–300 seconds (wait to fill batch before invocation)
• Visibility timeout: must be > Lambda function timeout × 6 (to prevent duplicate processing during retries)
• On failure: DLQ on SQS queue or Lambda destination (failure destination)
• ReportBatchItemFailures: Lambda reports specific failed messages → only failed items retried (not whole batch)

Kinesis / DynamoDB Streams + Lambda:

• Shard iterator = one Lambda invocation per active shard
• BisectBatchOnFunctionError: split batch and retry halves to isolate bad records
• DestinationConfig.OnFailure: send failed records to SQS or SNS
• MaximumRetryAttempts and MaximumRecordAgeInSeconds: limit retries to prevent infinite loops
• ParallelizationFactor: 1–10 concurrent invocations per shard (increase throughput)

5. Lambda Layers

• Package shared libraries and dependencies separately from function code
• Up to 5 layers per function
• Max unzipped size: 250MB (function + all layers combined)
• Layers can be shared across accounts (layer-based sharing for internal libraries)
• Common uses: AWS SDK extensions, pandas/numpy (large ML libraries), custom runtimes
• Not for secrets: use Secrets Manager or Parameter Store; not environment variables or layers

6. Lambda@Edge and CloudFront Functions

CloudFront Functions = simple transformations (URL rewrite, header manipulation, redirect). Lambda@Edge = complex logic (auth, A/B testing, geo-routing, dynamic origin selection).

7. Lambda Destinations

• Alternative to try/catch inside Lambda for async invocations
• Configure on-success and on-failure destinations:
  • SQS queue, SNS topic, EventBridge bus, another Lambda function
• Provides full invocation record (input + output/error) to destination
• More flexible than DLQ (which only sends failed event payload)

Key Concepts

• Execution environment — isolated container with function code, runtime, layers, and env vars; reused for warm invocations
• Handler — entry point function Lambda invokes (module.handler for Node.js, module.handler for Python)
• Execution role — IAM role Lambda assumes; defines what AWS services the function can call
• Resource-based policy — policy on the Lambda function itself; controls who can invoke it (other accounts, services)
• Lambda function URL — built-in HTTPS endpoint for Lambda without API Gateway; supports IAM or no auth
• Lambda extensions — lightweight processes running alongside Lambda function (observability agents, secrets caching)
• SnapStart — Java 11+ feature: snapshot initialized state of execution environment for sub-100ms cold starts
• Ephemeral storage /tmp — 512MB to 10GB per execution environment; NOT shared between invocations

Checklist

• SQS visibility timeout set to > Lambda timeout × 6 (prevent duplicate processing)?
• Reserved concurrency set to prevent one function from consuming all account concurrency?
• Provisioned concurrency configured for latency-sensitive APIs?
• Initialization code (clients, connections) outside handler function (module-level)?
• ReportBatchItemFailures enabled for SQS event source (partial batch success)?
• Lambda destinations configured for async invocations (on-success and on-failure)?
• Layers used for shared dependencies (not duplicated across functions)?
• Lambda execution role follows least-privilege principle?

Output Format

• 🔴 Critical — SQS visibility timeout < Lambda timeout (guarantees duplicate processing); Lambda function consuming full account concurrency (starving other functions); no error handling on async invocations (silent failures)
• 🟡 Warning — Cold starts affecting user-facing API (provisioned concurrency not configured); no DLQ/destination for async function failures; large deployment package (slow cold starts)
• 🟢 Suggestion — Lambda SnapStart for Java functions; Lambda function URL instead of API Gateway for simple use cases; layers for shared dependencies

Exam Tips

• SQS + Lambda: batch size up to 10,000; visibility timeout must be > Lambda timeout (to avoid duplicate processing during retries)
• Provisioned concurrency = eliminates cold starts; costs money even when idle (pre-initialized environments running 24/7)
• Lambda execution role = what Lambda CAN do (outbound AWS API calls); resource policy = who CAN invoke Lambda (inbound)
• Max execution timeout = 15 minutes; for longer tasks use Step Functions + Fargate or ECS tasks
• Lambda@Edge = deployed in us-east-1 ONLY but runs globally at CloudFront edge; CloudFront Functions = cheaper, sub-millisecond, simpler
• Layers = shared dependencies (SDK, pandas); NOT for secrets — use Secrets Manager or Parameter Store instead
• BisectBatchOnFunctionError (Kinesis/DynamoDB Streams): splits failing batch in half to isolate bad records, reducing reprocessing
• ReportBatchItemFailures (SQS): return failed message IDs — only those specific messages are retried, not the whole batch