Hector Ventura on foojay.io - Friends of OpenJDK

Foojay Podcast #96: Local AWS Development Without LocalStack: Meet Floci, the GraalVM-Powered Alternative

Mon, 25 May 2026 06:36:00 +0000

What if you could run 35 AWS services locally in under 25 milliseconds, using just 13 megabytes of memory, with a single Docker command and no cloud bill? That’s exactly what Floci does.

In this episode, Frank Delporte talks with Hector Ventura, the creator of Floci, a free and open-source cloud emulator built with Quarkus and GraalVM native compilation. Hector walks us through why he built it when LocalStack dropped its open-source community edition, how AI tooling helped him accelerate development of new service integrations, the challenges of keeping GraalVM happy with third-party libraries, and the road ahead for Azure and GCP support.

Introducing Floci: A High-Performance, GraalVM-Powered AWS Emulator

Fri, 03 Apr 2026 19:00:53 +0000

The Motivation: Why Another AWS Emulator?

As Java developers, we are used to local-first development. Tools that emulate the cloud environment have become essential for keeping feedback loops tight and costs at zero. However, the ecosystem has shifted. Many of us have felt the friction of:

Mandatory Authentication: Needing to log in or use tokens just to run local tests.
Heavy Resource Footprint: Docker containers that consume a lot of resources.
Slow Startup: Waiting several seconds for the environment to be ready.

I created Floci (from the floccus cloud formation) to solve these specific pain points. It is a 100% open-source, MIT-licensed alternative designed for speed, privacy, and simplicity.