亞馬遜移動拓展再發力

Hold the phone! Amazon Web Services is launching a mobile applications initiative. According to a company job post, AWS seeks a software development engineer for a new iOS/Android AWS initiative to be based in Palo Alto, Calif.

聽好了！亞馬遜（Amazon）網絡服務現在啓動了一個移動應用程序項目。該公司的一則招聘信息顯示，亞馬遜網絡服務正在爲該部門一個新的iOS/Android項目物色軟件開發工程師，工作地點在加州帕洛阿爾託。

The ideal candidate will have built a “top 25 app” and want to build a “brand new service from the ground floor”, according to the job post.

這則招聘廣告稱，理想的候選人應該開發過“排名前25”的應用程序，並願意“從零開始”，打造一款全新服務。

It continued: “In this role, you will be responsible for creating and owning world-class production tablet and web client applications across major platforms including iOS and Android . You must be willing to insist on the highest standards for quality, maintainability, and performance. You will ensure that engineering best practices are followed and that software is designed to be responsive, reliable and maintainable.”

廣告還寫道：“招聘職位負責開發、控制世界一流的產品——適用於iOS和Android等主流平板電腦和網絡客戶端應用。應聘者必須願意堅持最高的質量、可維護性和性能標準，確保遵循工程學最佳實踐，確保軟件反應迅速、可靠，並具有可維護性。”

TechCrunch first reported the news Sunday night.

TechCrunch最早於上週日晚報道了此事。

Developers typically access AWS from their PCs, but smartphones and tablets are quickly supplanting laptops and PCs as devices of choice for more workers, so it would make sense for AWS to turn more attention to those form factors. And, the company added Android and iOS support to the AWS management console so users can keep an eye on their services from their device of choice.

開發者通常從自己的個人電腦接入亞馬遜網絡服務，但智能手機和平板電腦正迅速取代筆記本和臺式機，成爲更多人的首選設備，因此亞馬遜將關注投向移動設備乃明智之舉。同時，亞馬遜網絡服務管理控制檯還開始支持Android和iOS，以便用戶能通過更多設備查看、設置服務。

Miko Matsumura, SVP of platform marketing for Kii, a Mobile-Backend-as-a-Service (MBaaS) provider, said this post talks about client app development rather than a software development kit so would not be directly competitive with what Kii does. But it is also possible that AWS will build its own MVaaS — something that GigaOM Pro analyst Janakiram MSV posited in a post (subscription required) a few weeks ago. According to MSV:

移動後端即服務（Mobile-Backend-as-a-Service）供應商Kii公司平臺營銷高級副總裁米克?松樹表示，這則招聘廣告說到的是客戶端應用開發，而不是軟件開發工具包，因此不會同Kii的產品形成直接競爭。但也有可能亞馬遜網絡服務將打造自己的視頻管理服務，GigaOM Pro分析師簡納基蘭姆?MSV數週前就在一篇博文（需訂閱才能閱讀）中提出了這一假設。據MSV稱：

“AWS has all the required building blocks to expose mobile backend services. Amazon EC2, Amazon S3, Amazon DynamoDB, and Amazon RDS already form the backbone of many mobile applications today. The AWS SDK for Android and iOS makes it easy for developers to consume these services.”

“亞馬遜網絡服務部門要提供移動後端服務可謂萬事俱備。亞馬遜雲計算平臺EC2、亞馬遜簡易存儲服務S3、亞馬遜DynamoDB雲端服務以及亞馬遜關係數據庫服務RDS已經成爲衆多移動應用程序的基礎。支持Android和iOS的亞馬遜網絡服務軟件開發工具包將幫助開發者們更輕鬆地使用這些服務。”

General purpose Platforms as a Service (PaaSes) neglected this mobile segment — so startups like Kinvey, Parse, Stackmob, and Kii rushed to fill the void. Now, the bigger PaaS players are adding more mobile capabilities — witness Microsoft’s addition of mobile services to Windows Azure last summer. MBaaS partisans claim it’s too little too late, but others predict a shakeout in this segment.

通用型平臺即服務（PaaSes）忽略了移動細分市場，而Kinvey、Parse、Stackmob以及Kii等新創企業迅速填補了這個空白。現在，規模較大的平臺即服務公司正在增加更多的移動性能，去年夏天微軟（Microsoft）爲Windows Azure添加移動服務即是一例。移動後端即服務的支持者稱這些努力缺乏力度，而且爲時已晚，但很多人認爲這將引發移動子市場劇烈動盪。

Sravish Sridhar, CEO of Cambridge, Mass.-based Kinvey, who looked at the ad, said the fact that AWS is looking for front-end developers is not a huge surprise but added that the GigaOM Pro report about AWS moving into mobile backend services was spot on. “If AWS is looking to launch a Backend as a Service offering, they need seasoned front-end developers because, you need to build world-class client-side libraries to abstract the backend stack. For mobile developers, the client-side library is the new API,” he noted.

位於馬薩諸塞州坎布里奇的Kinvey公司首席執行官斯拉維希?斯瑞達在看過該招聘廣告後表示，亞馬遜網絡服務部門招聘前端開發人員並不奇怪。但他補充說，科技網站GigaOM Pro關於亞馬遜網絡服務部門進軍移動後端服務的報道完全正確。斯瑞達指出：“如果亞馬遜網絡服務打算推出移動後端即服務產品，他們需要經驗豐富的前端開發人員。因爲要吸引後端人才，必須打造頂級的客戶端庫。對移動開發人員而言，客戶端庫就如同應用程序界面。”

He also said that it’s a no-brainer for Amazon to add more mobile backend services this since he sees mobile “driving the adoption of cloud in the enterprise. It’s likely that AWS has seen this as well and has realized that it needs to improve its mobile cloud offering to get ‘corporate mobile payloads’ (to paraphrase VMware’s term) to run on AWS.”

斯瑞達還表示，亞馬遜肯定應增加移動後端服務，因爲他看到移動“正推動亞馬遜採用雲技術。亞馬遜網絡服務部門很可能也看到了這點，並意識到自己需要完善移動雲產品，以使‘企業移動載荷’（ 改述Vmware的術語）在亞馬遜網絡服務上順暢運行。”

I will update this story if and when Amazon responds to requests for comment.

如果亞馬遜回覆我的置評請求，我會及時更新。