Step 05: Creating initial backstage configuration files

Building a Self-Service Confluent Developer Platform with Backstage and Confluent Cloud

5.1 Create the organization file and add your user

Now, let’s define our organization’s structure. Create a directory for our templates and organization data and an org.yaml file:

mkdir -p confluent-self-service-templates
touch confluent-self-service-templates/org.yaml

Create the org.yaml file with environment variables using this script:

cat > confluent-self-service-templates/org.yaml << EOL
apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: User
metadata:
  name: ${GITHUB_USERNAME}
  annotations:
    github.com/login: ${GITHUB_USERNAME}
spec:
  profile:
    displayName: "${USER_DISPLAY_NAME}"
    email: "${USER_EMAIL}"
  memberOf: [guests]


---
apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: Group
metadata:
  name: guests
spec:
  type: team
  children: []
EOL

This script will create the org.yaml file with the environment variables properly substituted. Make sure you have set the environment variables before running this script:

GITHUB_USERNAME
USER_DISPLAY_NAME
USER_EMAIL

ℹ️

The script uses a heredoc (<< EOL) to create the file, which allows us to use environment variables directly in the content. The variables will be expanded when the script runs.

Step 5.2 : Creating first static software catalog entry for Confluent Cloud

Create an entities.yaml file in the confluent-self-service-templates directory:

touch confluent-self-service-templates/entities.yaml

Add following content to the entities.yaml file:

confluent-self-service-templates/entities.yaml

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: System
metadata:
  name: confluent-cloud
spec:
  owner: guests

This entry will be used as the root entity for our Confluent Cloud resources in backstage entities graph.

Update the app-config.yaml file to include the catalog locations:

First, remove the default example catalog locations that come with a fresh Backstage installation:

app-config.yaml

locations:
  # Local example data, file locations are relative to the backend process, typically `packages/backend`
  - type: file
    target: ../../examples/entities.yaml

  # Local example template
  - type: file
    target: ../../examples/template/template.yaml
    rules:
      - allow: [Template]

  # Local example organizational data
  - type: file
    target: ../../examples/org.yaml
    rules:
      - allow: [User, Group]

Then, add our custom catalog locations:

app-config.yaml

catalog:
  import:
    entityFilename: catalog-info.yaml
    pullRequestBranchName: backstage-integration
  rules:
    - allow: [Component, System, API, Resource, Location]
  locations:
    # Local organizational data
    - type: file
      target: ../../confluent-self-service-templates/org.yaml
      rules:
        - allow: [User, Group]
        
    # Local entities
    - type: file
      target: ../../confluent-self-service-templates/entities.yaml

Step 04: Configuring GitHub authentication and GitHub Actions Step 06: Building a custom plugin for secret handling