Built by an instructor, for instructors

Create custom cloud computing lab activities for your class.

Clearbyte is a tool for creating custom cloud computing labs. You author the lab as small ordered steps, students complete it in a real AWS account launched from your LMS, and their work is graded automatically against what they actually built.

AWS Academy gives you a solid set of labs, but they're fixed. This exists for the times you need to go further — to add steps where students are getting stuck, and drop the ones they don't need.

Try it with your class Browse the labs

A student working through a lab on a laptop

How it works

The part that matters is the second step. Everything else is plumbing.

1
You write the lab

Lay it out as small, ordered steps. You decide what gets covered, in what order, and how far it goes.
2
You change it when the class struggles

If a cohort stalls on the same step, rewrite that part and reissue it. You're not waiting on anyone's release cycle.
3
Students work in real AWS

Each student gets credentials and console access to a live AWS account, launched from your LMS over LTI 1.3.
4
Graded, then torn down

Work is checked against what was actually built in the account. The score goes to your gradebook and the account is destroyed.

Why small steps

Small steps are easier to follow, but that isn't really the point. They tell you where the class is stuck. When eleven students stall on the same step, you know exactly which step to rewrite — and you can have it rewritten before the next section meets.

You can see where it breaks

A stalled step is a specific thing you can fix, not a vague sense that the lab was hard.

Fits the time you have

Sized to a class period, not a corporate training calendar.

Real AWS, not a mock

Small steps, but the account and the credentials are the real thing.

Compared with the alternatives

Most instructors teaching cloud end up choosing between a provided lab catalog and building the whole thing themselves.

	Clearbyte	A provided lab catalog	Building it yourself
Write your own labs	Yes	No — used as provided	Yes
Revise a lab mid-semester	Yes	No	Yes
Real AWS account per student	Yes	Usually	You build it
Launches from your LMS	Yes, over LTI 1.3	Varies	You build it
Graded against the account	Yes	Varies	You build it
Account destroyed after	Yes, automatically	Usually	You build it

"A provided lab catalog" covers the prebuilt labs that ship with cloud curricula such as AWS Academy. They're a reasonable starting point; the difference is whether you can change them.

The labs so far

These run in real cloud courses today. Use them as they are, or as a starting point for your own.

View all labs →

Teaching a cloud course?

If this would help your students, send over what you're teaching and your class can be set up with the right labs.

Try it with your class

Create custom cloud computing lab activities for your class.

How it works

You write the lab

You change it when the class struggles

Students work in real AWS

Graded, then torn down