AWS Unplugged: From LocalStack to Amazon Q

Two lightning ⚡ talks roughly 30mins each.

📅 Date & Time: Wednesday, 6 August 2025 | 18:45 – 20:30 (SAST)

Topics
⚡ Amazon Q – Your Very Eager Intern.
Jason Nicholls will give us a sharp, insightful look at Amazon Q, AWS’s powerful AI assistant for developers. He'll explore how it's changing the way we build, troubleshoot, and ship cloud applications. Expect practical takeaways, and some fresh perspective on generative AI in engineering teams.

⚡ A Local Cloud? Using LocalStack for AWS Development!
Vutlhari Rikhotso (aka VT) returns to our stage! He’ll unpack LocalStack, the go-to tool for local AWS development and testing. Learn how to spin up AWS services locally, streamline your development cycle, and run integration tests without touching the cloud.

📢 Speakers 📢
🧍 Jason Nicholls is a Principal Solutions Architect at Amazon Web Services (AWS). A familiar face in the AWS community, he's been a long-time contributor and fan favourite to the AWS User Groups and is known for delivering talks packed with practical insights and deep cloud expertise.
🔗 Jason on LinkedIn

🧍 Vutlhari Rikhotso is a Managing Consultant at Daemon and repeat speaker in the AWS community. He last spoke about Serverless in 2024, and this time he's back to deep dive into dev-first tooling with LocalStack.
🔗 Vutlhari on LinkedIn

🎉 Sponsor 🎉
DVT Johannesburg is very generously sponsoring the venue, food, and drinks for this event.
🔗 dvt.co.za

🏚️ Venue 🏚️
This will be an in-person only event. Free and secure parking on site.
📍 Dynamic Technologies Building, 2 Venus St, Melrose Estate, Johannesburg, 2196

✏️ Requirements ✏️
Free, but make sure to RSVP so we can know that you're coming. No strict dress code, just come as you are!

⏳ Agenda ⏳
18:45 - 19:00 🚙🧃 Arrival, networking,
19:00 - 20:00 ☁️ Presentations
20:00 - 20:30 🌍🍕 Food and Beverages