Amazon beefs up heavy graphics support for mobile developers

LAS VEGAS---Amazon Web Services has been steadily building its toolset specifically for mobile developers since the first AWS re:Invent summit a year ago.

The Internet giant continued that movement with the introduction of Amazon AppStream, essentially taking the brunt of heavy workloads associated with 2D and 3D graphics on moblile apps.

The general idea is to ensure that problems around graphics rendering and compute power requirements don't hinder developers from building complex mobile apps, which will ideally end up in Amazon's AppStore.

According to the plan, AppStream runs the server-side application code on AWS EC2 instances. The product then streams the output to the end user's desktop or mobile device, albeit following the installation of a client app functioning as the gateway here.

AWS stresses that the type of device receiving the output is irrelevant given that the AppStream is supposed to stream the user experience uniformly with an HD video-like quality through the Amazon STX protocol.

AppStream also captures user data and brings that information to the cloud. Naturally, that might ruffle some feathers in a post NSA/Prism era.

But the AWS team defended in a blog post, which provides many more nitty-gritty details about how AppStream functions, that the proprietary code is stored in the cloud, making it "safe from tampering" and "resistant to theft."

AppStream is available now, albeit in "limited preview fashion." Interested developers can apply to test it out now.