Amazon Web Services (AWS) recently announced the test launch of App Studio, its generative AI programming platform that allows employees with basic tech skills to build apps simply by describing what it needs to do—no coding required.
”In just minutes, App Studio builds an application that could have taken a professional developer days to build from scratch,” Amazon said in its announcement, noting that “technical professionals without software development skills” can use it, “eliminating the need for operational expertise.”
But giving technical employees a way to design and build applications is not that simple, veteran software developer Rob Howard told Decrypt.
“From what we've seen, AI-generated code can significantly speed up the software development process, but we have yet to see AI-generated software that really replicates what a higher-end professional developer would do—especially for enterprise-level software like this,” he explained.
Howard has more than two decades of experience in software development and is a technology educator and AI expert. He said the demands of a large organization are too demanding and dynamic to leave solely to an AI-based model.
“I'm skeptical that this release is going to be able to accomplish as much as has been promised without any intervention from a software developer,” he noted. “We definitely will see AI-powered software creation improve over time, but it seems premature to totally remove the need for a senior engineer or software developer to be involved.”
“Especially for business functions that are mission critical, have high traffic use, or require high levels of uptime, security, privacy, or any other type of advanced features that you would expect in enterprise-grade software,” Howard continued.
He said he’s curious to see how App Builder evolves.
“I do think that we will continue to see major improvements there. It just remains to be seen if this release from Amazon is that improvement, or if it's just a step in that direction,” Howard said.
He pointed out that the AWS solution appears to target the need for higher-level employees. While they typically have higher salaries, they are also more likely to have more skills, training, and certifications. Howard said the approach runs counter to the current AI trend that strives to keep top talent while eliminating entry-level positions.
“One thing we've definitely seen in the software development industry is that AI tools are able to do a lot of the grunt work or rote labor that a lot of senior developers would rather not do anyway,” he said.
“It seems like Amazon would like to get to a place where a layperson could create an entire dashboard or a visualization tool without a developer,” Howard added. “AI coding tools have replaced junior and entry-level developers, but they haven't really replaced those senior developer positions quite yet.”
Amazon does not charge a per-user licensing fee for App Builder, unlike some enterprise software and AI platforms. The service is currently free for Amazon AWS customers to build with, and companies will only pay for the time employees spend using the published applications.
According to the company, the App Studio is currently only available in one of its AWS Regions, U.S. West located in Oregon. That means any user within that region can currently access and deploy the service.
Edited by Ryan Ozawa.