AWS-sfn , Is there any way to stop scheduled step functions? - amazon-web-services

Im developer who is new to AWS.
While configuring step functions, I found there are some senarious that there could be multiple step functions instance executed because of timer I've set.
for the step function that I configured follows below process
wait 2 minute
execute lambda function
since there is timer in my step function, there could be some cases that, step function might invoked multiple times at a time.
the thing is that, I wan't to guarantee that on execution queue, only one step function in on.
so if any other step function gets invoked, while step function in on running(timing), I wan't to terminate step function that just got invoked. is there any way to list step functions that are executing?

You can't prevent an execution from starting, but you can list the executions at the start of your Step Function, and exit early if a running execution is found.
The ListExecutions API lists the executions for a given state machine ARN. Call it in a Task, setting the statusFilter to RUNNING to return only in-progress executions. You'll get back a list of matching execution items. All you care about is whether the length > 0.
Finally, insert a Choice state. If there are running items, exit. If no running items, continue with the execution.

Related

How to wait for multiple parallel tasks to all finish first to proceed to next state in AWS Step Function?

I'm trying to build a process like this:
In state1, it will trigger 10 lambdas, and only when ALL those 10 lambda respond/ or call callback with taskToken, it will then proceed to next state2.
How to design this process?
This is a perfect scenario for the Map state. You can pass in an array of lambda function names, then add a Lambda task and use the Parameters block to set the function dynamically. And if you want them to run one at a time instead of in parallel, you can set MaxConcurrency.

When a state of a step function times out, does the lambda execution correlated to it continue to be performed?

I want to know if a lambda execution continues to be performed even if the state of the step function correlated to it times out. If it happens, how can i stop it?
There is no way to kill a running lambda. However, you can set concurrency limit to 0 to stop it from starting further executions
Standard StepFunctions have a max timeout of 1 year. (yes! One year)
As such any individual task also has a max timeout of 1 year.
(Express StepFunctions have a timeout of 30 seconds mind you)
Lambda's have a max time out of 15 mins.
If you need your lambda to complete in a certain amount of time, you are best served by setting your lambda timeout to that - not your state machine. (i see in your comments you say you cannot pass a value for this? If you cannot change it then you have no choice but to let it run its course)
Consider StepFunctions and state machines to be orchestrators, but they have very little control over the individual components. They tell who to act and when but otherwise are stuck waiting on those components to reply before continuing.
If your lambda times out, it will cause your StateMachine to fail that task as as it receives a lambda service error. You can then handle that in the StepFunction without failing the entire process, see:
https://docs.aws.amazon.com/step-functions/latest/dg/concepts-error-handling.html
You could specifically use: TimeoutSecondsPath in your definition to set a specific result if the task timesout.
But as stated, no, once a lambda begins execution it will continue until it finishes or it times out at 15 mins / its set timeout.

Two-Phase Starting of an AWS Step Function?

Scenario
I'm looking for a way to create an instance of a step function that waits for me to start it. Pseudo code would look like this.
StateMachine myStateMachine = new();
string executionArn = myStateMachine.ExecutionArn;
myStateMachine.Start();
Use Case
We need a way to reliably store the Execution ARN of a step function to a database. If we fail to write the Execution ARN to the database, we won't call the Start method and the step function should timeout. If the starting of the step function fails, the database operation would be rolled back.
These are the steps we plan to take
A local transaction is started
The step function instance is created, but not started
The ExecutionArn of the created step function instance is recorded in a database
The step function is started
The local transaction is committed
Is there a simple way to start a step function like this?
Below is the result of some research I've done on this so far.
Manual Callbacks
Following information in this article https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/compute/implementing-serverless-manual-approval-steps-in-aws-step-functions-and-amazon-api-gateway/,
I create an empty activity, then us this activity as the first step in the step function and add a timeout of 30 seconds to the activity step. The expectation was that if I didn't send a success to that activity task in the step function then the step would timeout and the workflow would fail, but it isn't doing that. Even though I set the timeout to 30 seconds, the step is not timing out. I'm guessing the timeout is about how long it waits for the step function to be able to schedule the activity, not how long it waits for the step function to move on from the activity step.
I've also considered using an SQS SendMessage step with Wait for callback checked and with a similar timeout, but that would require I create a throw-away SQS queue just to contain messages I never intend to read, plus I'm guessing the timeout functionality would work the same here as in an activity.
Wait State
There may be something I can do with a Wait state and parallel branches by following the accepted answer in this SO article: Does AWS Step Functions have a timeout feature?, but before I go down that route I want to see if something simpler can be done.
Global Timeout
I have found that step functions have a global timeout, and that is useful in this case if I use it in conjunction with a step that pauses until my application explicitly resumes it, but the global timeout is only useful if it can be reasonably low (like 20 minutes) and still have the step function viable for all use cases. For instance, if the maximum time it should take to run the step function is 2 or 3 minutes, then all is fine. But if I have another step in the step function that can take longer than 20 minutes then I can't use the global timer anymore or I have to start setting it to something very high, which I don't want to do.
Is there anything I can do here easily that I'm overlooking?
Thanks
Two-phase initialization of a step function cannot be done. We've worked around this by:
Our Application: Writing a row in our DB to indicate the intent to start a step function
Our Application: Start the step function
Our Application: Record the ExecutionArn of the step function instance in the created row
Step Function: Have the step function wait on step 1 indefinitely on an SQS step
Our Application: Poll the SQS queue and either abort the step function or allow it to proceed to the next step by sending a callback to the SQS step. (This is the 2nd phase)

AWS lambda sequentially invoke same function

I have nearly 1000 items in my DB. I have to run the same operation on each item. The issue is that this is a third party service that has a 1 second rate limit for each operation. Until now, I was able to do the entire thing inside a lambda function. It is now getting close to the 15 minute (900 second) timeout limit.
I was wondering what the best way for splitting this would be. Can I dump each item (or batches of items) into SQS and have a lambda function process them sequentially? But from what I understood, this isn't the recommended way to do this as I can't delay invocations sufficiently long. Or I would have to call lambda within a lambda, which also sounds weird.
Is AWS Step Functions the way to go here? I haven't used that service yet, so I was wondering if there are other options too. I am also using the serverless framework for doing this if it is of any significance.
Both methods you mentioned are options that would work. Within lambda you could add a delay (sleep) after one item has been processed and then trigger another lambda invocation following the delay. You'll be paying for that dead time, of course, if you use this approach, so step functions may be a more elegant solution. One lambda can certainly invoke another--even invoking itself. If you invoke the next lambda asynchronously, then the initial function will finish while the newly-invoked function starts to run. This article on Asynchronous invocation will be useful for that approach. Essentially, each lambda invocation would be responsible for processing one item, delaying sufficiently to accommodate the service limit, and then invoking the next item.
If anything goes wrong you'd want to build appropriate exception handling so a problem with one item either halts the rest or allows the rest of the chain to continue, depending on what is appropriate for your use case.
Step Functions would also work well to handle this use case. With options like Wait and using a loop you could achieve the same result. For example, your step function flow could invoke one lambda that processes an item and returns the next item, then it could next run a wait step, then process the next item and so on until you reach the end. You could use a Map that runs a lambda task and a wait task:
The Map state ("Type": "Map") can be used to run a set of steps for
each element of an input array. While the Parallel state executes
multiple branches of steps using the same input, a Map state will
execute the same steps for multiple entries of an array in the state
input.
This article on Iterating a Loop Using Lambda is also useful.
If you want the messages to be processed serially and are happy to dump the messages to sqs, set both the concurency of the lambda and the batchsize property of the sqs event that triggers the function to 1
Make it a FIFO queue so that messages dont potentially get processed more than once if that is important.

TimerTrigger Schedules and code execution time

What happens if a function gets invoked by a TimerTigger every 5 minutes and for some reasons the code takes more than 5 minutes to complete?
Does this result in my function running twice at the same time?
Or does the interval start when the triggered code execution is completed?
I could not find an answer myself in the docs.
I have to ensure that my function is running always as singleton.
Thanks,
Alex
If your function execution takes longer than the timer interval, another execution won't be triggered until after the current invocation completes. The next execution is scheduled after the execution completes. You can see this in the code here. You can prove this to yourself by trying a simple local example - create a function that runs every 5 seconds, and put a sleep in there for a minute. You won't see another function start until the first finishes.
As far as running singleton, the above shows that only a single function invocation runs at a given time on the same instance (VM). The SDK further ensures that no other functions are running across scaled out instances. You can read more about that here. To see this in action, you can simulate by starting two instances of your console app locally - one will run the schedule the other will not. However, if you kill the one running the schedule, the other one will pick it up after a short time (within a minute).