Serverless

Ever needed to automatically generate screenshots of web pages? Maybe for social media previews, monitoring, or just because manually screenshotting 50 URLs sounds like torture. I built this exact API for a client who needed to generate previews of user-submitted websites. Here’s how to build your own serverless screenshot service that can handle thousands of requests without breaking the bank. Why Lambda + Puppeteer? Before we dive in, let’s talk about why this architecture makes sense: ...

AWS Lambda VPC Configuration: The Complete Guide to Private Networking and Cost Optimization with NAT Instances Three months ago, I got a $400 AWS bill that made me question everything I knew about serverless architecture. The culprit? NAT Gateways supporting Lambda functions that barely handled 10,000 requests per month. That’s when I learned the hard way that “serverless” doesn’t mean “cheap” when you need proper networking. After weeks of deep-diving into VPC configurations, NAT alternatives, and cost optimization, I cut our Lambda networking costs by 85% while maintaining security and performance. Here’s everything I learned about running Lambda functions in VPCs the cost-effective way. ...

Zero to Production: Deploy a Full-Stack App with SST and AWS in 60 Minutes In 2025, deploying production-ready applications shouldn’t require weeks of DevOps work. Today, I’ll show you how to build and deploy a full-stack serverless application in just 60 minutes using SST (Serverless Stack) v3, the framework that’s revolutionizing how we build on AWS. What We’re Building We’ll create a real-time collaborative todo application with: Backend: Serverless API with Lambda and API Gateway Database: DynamoDB for scalable data storage Authentication: AWS Cognito for secure user management Frontend: React app with real-time updates Hosting: S3 and CloudFront for global distribution The best part? Everything is type-safe, from infrastructure to API calls. ...