Amazon upgrades Ruby SDK to help developers write less code

For developers who want to build applications that use Amazon's cloud services, the company offers a number of platforms to choose between. For those who prefer Ruby, the first stable release of version 2 of the AWS SDK for Ruby is now available.

The whole point of the SDKs from Amazon is to take some of the complexity out of coding. With the new version, which supports more than 40 services, Amazon offers more help to developers than before. The upgrades include improved resource interfaces, a code streamlining feature called Waiters and improved documentation, which shouldn't be underestimated.

The improved resource interfaces allow for batch operations, for example. A developer can now close all running instances [or virtual servers] with just two API calls, using less hand-written code than was previously needed.

The Waiters also decrease the amount of code developers have to write, in this case the number of lines needed to poll an instance or some other computing resource to see when it becomes available.

To lower the bar for taking advantage of version 2 -- which isn't backwards compatible with the first version -- Amazon has made it possible to use both in the same project. That makes it possible to migrate over time, with small steps if necessary.

The SDK is available for download from the Rubygems website.

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