[spitfire]

I wish they hadn't named the units of computation "Lambda functions". Cause, you know there's already something known as a "Lambda function" in computer science.

But kudos for Amazon for furthering the datacenter-is-the-computer approach. It is simply the right thing to do.

[yzzxy]

Ironic that this is posted on news.ycombinator.com of all sites...

[mehh]

Really douche to use a computer science term as your product name, are they going to trade mark that or are the just happy with the confusion it will cause.

[codezero]

I have a hard time believing there is cause for confusion here, have Physicists been stumped by Amazon Redshift? I'm not being facetious, I just don't see how a product name that is niche to people using Amazon services is likely to confuse people.

Also, CS hardly owns the greek letter lambda, it like many greek letters has been used for many products and features over the years. Delta is an airline, but they're doing OK, among others. I am just curious what your issue with this is, and if you can come up with some concrete scenarios where this could really confuse people.

[mehh]

When I've done searches for redshift I have actually ended up having to clarify which type I mean.

As someone who does use AWS a lot and lambda functions, then yes, overloading the term is dumb. I'll also probably end up using Lambda functions.

[yzzxy]

The meaning of "lambda" in computer science is functionally (no pun intended) similar enough to what amazon is selling that people learning programming and nontechnicals or even IT pros who work with programmers will inevitably be confused.

[codezero]

It seems like you're seriously saying that people who are studying computer science lack the ability to tell the difference.

Naming the product something that closely resembles its functionality seems like a great idea for a product. It's still Amazon Lambda, and I think it's very unlikely that people will simply refer to it as "Lambda." If CS students find themselves hopelessly confused by this product name, they are going to have a real hard time tying their own shoes.

If you search for Y Combinator, luckily, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y_combinator still shows up on the first page of results, I expect the same will be true for Lambda, so I can confidently say we won't lose a generation of CS students to this faux pas.

[yzzxy]

I'm not arguing they will not be able to tell the difference... I'm arguing it will cause confusion at some point, and maybe that's a negative externality of naming this product "Lambda." Nobody said "lose a generation of CS students."

And, as I've noticed in the past, searching for "y combinator" + any language name will often keep useful results away until you finally block this site. I'm not sure if this is still comprehensively true, but it seemed so to me at one point. So there is a very real impact on search results that can happen.

[ashr]

I hear there is a river named Amazon in Southern Hemisphere and there are people landing in Seattle for river expeditions.

[codezero]

I was being overly sarcastic there, sorry about that. I just don't think this will ever be a problem for people, if anything Amazon adopting it may help people learn more about it, all the same, I guess it could go either way, I'll quiz some candidates in a few years to see if they ran into Lambda as a stumbling point :)

[duaneb]

I can't believe people reuse names and phrases either!!

[erichmond]

I'm guessing they borrowed it from this : http://lambda-architecture.net/

[turingbook]

The Forbes article said it is named after Star Wars space craft: http://www.forbes.com/sites/benkepes/2014/11/13/more-amazoni...

But I think it is simply named after the functional language feature. The core concept of this service is function.

[apetresc]

I'm not sure what Nathan Marz's "Lambda Architecture" has anything to do with AWS Lambda, though

[bruceboughton]

I don't think so. That is another naming abomination.

[duaneb]

If you got confused by amazon offering lambda functions, I'm pretty sure you have no idea what they are.

[ghshephard]

I'm just the opposite - when I heard they were releasing a new service called Lamda, I immediately wondered whether it was like the inline lambda function in Python - and when I read through the description - they were very similar in nature.

Amazon has a LOT of services, and the better the naming scheme they use, the easier it will be to remember what they each are. I'm genuinely happy that they used a name that will make it trivial to map the function (heh) it serves in my head.