Amazon Web Services is stepping up integration between its own cloud services, adding two new features to its Aurora MySQL-compatible database.

The first update sees Aurora gain the ability to invoke Lambda functions, which means users can connect the Aurora database to AWS’s other services and load data into Aurora directly from the Amazon Simple Storage Service.

AWS describes Lambda as a serverless compute service which runs code automatically in response to events, while managing the underlying compute resources. Thanks to the update, users can now write stored procedures in Aurora that invoke Lambda’s functions. What this means is that users could, for example, use Aurora to issue notifications via the Amazon Simple Notification Service, update Amazon DynamoDB tables or send emails with the Amazon Simple Email Service. Aurora can also invoke Lambda functions at the application level to carry out complex tasks like tracking and auditing actions on database tables, implementing complex ETL jobs and advanced performance monitoring and analysis.

The second update allows S3 bucket data to be imported directly into Aurora, doing away with the need to first copy that data onto an EC2 instance before it could be imported. AWS says the data can be imported directly from any region the Aurora cluster has access to.

The updates come just weeks after Larry Ellison, founder and chief technology officer of rival company Oracle Corp., launched a stinging attack on the Aurora database at Oracle OpenWorld. Ellison criticized Aurora for lacking a number of key features, while accusing AWS of trying to lock-in customers to its platform.

AWS said the new features in Aurora are available now, at no extra cost.