Node v18 Released

[chenrui333]

Even though we are still waiting for node v16 base image, this is the issue tracker for node v18 base image

https://nodejs.org/en/blog/announcements/v18-release-announce/

[jlarmstrongiv]

I’ve been waiting for someone to do this 🤣 thanks

[luizcorreia]

Maybe that way, the Node v18 will be done before past one year.

[mikepage]

Best thing you could do to enjoy Node v18 like-features is move to Netlify. They released Edge functions with Deno deploy: https://www.netlify.com/blog/announcing-serverless-compute-with-edge-functions

Do tell Vercel, they may reconsider using AWS lambda images :)

[chenrui333]

I honestly don't mind receiving flood of email notifications, since we really need to get more ppl to pressure AWS to stay on top of this NodeJS runtime update game.

[davecarlson]

Maybe that way, the Node v18 will be done before past one year.

Honestly, having a 6 month bake (releasing the april LTS release in around October for lambda) would be a good compromise. gives enough time for tests and means we're only "one version behind"

[vith]

Honestly, having a 6 month bake (releasing the april LTS release in around October for lambda) would be a good compromise. gives enough time for tests and means we're only "one version behind"

Isn't that what the 6 months between v18 release on 2022-04-19 and v18 becoming LTS on 2022-10-25 is for?

Amazon can start making v18 images available now if they want to have 6 months of testing before offering v18 as LTS.

[davecarlson]

Honestly, having a 6 month bake (releasing the april LTS release in around October for lambda) would be a good compromise. gives enough time for tests and means we're only "one version behind"

Isn't that what the 6 months between v18 release on 2022-04-19 and v18 becoming LTS on 2022-10-25 is for?

Amazon can start making v18 images available now if they want to have 6 months of testing before offering v18 as LTS.

Yes, that's exactly my point - AWS just also use that same bake time to prepare, then launch the node version as soon as it becomes active LTS

[dl748]

Should be noted as well, that they will be transitioning to Javascript SDK V3 as well for the default SDK.

[adcreare]

Like many others I agree with the sentiments, AWS needs to get better on this.
I suggest everyone bug their account managers, technical account managers and log support tickets if you haven’t already.

I went back and dug out the release history of lambda back to node 8. It is not a pretty sight.

The current delay is second only to the delay with the node 10 release, that took until May 13. After Node 10 things got better - Node 12 dropped very promptly, 14 it started to drift back out and with 16 we’re back to at least May.

Interesting to note the other two major cloud providers, ie Google and Azure, did manage to get 16 out in a timely manner.

Node 16: 
	Node LTS: 2021-10-26
	AWS Lambda Release:  ???
	Google Cloud Functions release: 2021-11-17
	Azure  Functions release: 2021-11-22
Node 14: 
	Node LTS: 2020-10-20
	AWS Lambda Release: 2021-02-03
Node 12: 
	Node LTS: 2019-10-22 
	AWS Lambda Release: 2019-11-18
Node 10:
	Node LTS: 2018-10-30
	AWS Lambda Release: 2019-05-13
Node 8:
	Node LTS: 2017-10-31
	AWS Lambda Release: 2018-04-02

[paul-uz]

@adcreare I mean, it's not like Amazon is a multi-billion dollar company.... oh wait

[jtuliani]

Thanks all for the keen interest in seeing Node releases land promptly in Lambda.

Regarding Node releases in general, we're tracking the Active LTS release dates in October, not the 'Current' release dates in April. This is because, as stated at https://nodejs.org/en/about/releases/, "Production applications should only use Active LTS or Maintenance LTS releases".

As @adcreare pointed out above, there have been delays between Active LTS and our corresponding GA releases, not least for Node 16 (see #14 for latest status). While I can't give an ETA for Node 18 yet, we do hear your feedback and this is something we're actively working to improve.

[faradaytrs]

@jtuliani Well you could add it as beta status or something, actually node 12 is also not usable in production because it's not supported anymore, but you still have this runtime supported. I think it's nothing bad about thinking of new releases in advance. "Current" version is stable enough for some simple applications. It's a good idea to release it right when it hits lts status.
Having this runtime for lambda doesn't equal using it in production. We might use it in testing instances.

[GrahamCampbell]

Regarding Node releases in general, we're tracking the Active LTS release dates in October, not the 'Current' release dates in April. This is because, as stated at https://nodejs.org/en/about/releases/, "Production applications should only use Active LTS or Maintenance LTS releases".

Then why is your node 16 image that is just released based on node 16.4, which by your version definition, should not be used in production, because it was released multiple months before the first 16.x LTS version!!!

[dl748]

@jtuliani Well you could add it as beta status or something

This is "close" to what I'd like. i'm thinking more like nodejs18.x-experimental that can only to assigned through the API/CLI and not through the console (currently how 16 is working now). Where, if they are are worried about support, have a flag that needs to be sent via API, "agree_experimental": true when sending a runtime of "*-experimental", where the usage agreement is "use at your own risk".... then when GA is ready or close, they make a nodejs18.x

This would allow us to deploy an experimental version and allow us to fix bugs ahead of the GA releases.

If someone wants to use this for production purposes, that's their issue then as they agreed to the terms.