David Nalley walks through how user feedback and a decision-making framework reshaped the AWS developer experience. Users told us getting started on AWS was too hard: credit cards required before you could explore, IAM complexity on day one, surprise bills, and an experience built for enterprises with cloud architects on staff. So we fixed it. Whether you are building a platform, maintaining an open source project, or designing your own product, you will leave with a practical framework for identifying and eliminating one-way doors in your developer experience.
Sobre David Nalley: David Nalley is Director of Developer Experience at Amazon Web Services (AWS), where he leads efforts to improve how developers interact with AWS services and technologies. He brings over two decades of experience in technology to his role.



Nalley is currently the Governing Board chair for the Agentic AI Foundation (AAIF) and serves on the Board of Directors for the Internet Security Research Group. Nalley previously served as President of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) for 4 years.



At AWS, Nalley works to connect cloud technologies with developer needs and strengthen relationships between AWS and the developer community. His organization focuses on ensuring AWS services meet real-world developer requirements while advancing strategic initiatives that benefit both AWS and the broader developer ecosystem. Show less