apidays Australia 2023 - Platforms, Products, and People: The Power of APIs October 11 & 12, 2023 https://www.apidays.global/australia/ Discovering APIs And More With An Internal Developer Portal Jon Scheele, Founder & CEO of Blue Connector, and Organizer of apidays Singapore ------ Check out our conferences at https://www.apidays.global/ Do you want to sponsor or talk at one of our conferences? https://apidays.typeform.com/to/ILJeAaV8 Learn more on APIscene, the global media made by the community for the community: https://www.apiscene.io Explore the API ecosystem with the API Landscape: https://apilandscape.apiscene.io/

1. Discovering APIs and more with an
Internal Developer Portal
Jon Scheele, founder @ Blue Connector

3. As a Developer
What language to use?
Where to store code?
What resources can I use?
Where is the documentation?

4. As a CIO/CTO/Chief Architect
How to accelerate delivery?
How to promote standards?
How to promote re-use?
How to reduce architectural debt?

5. As a Platform Engineer
Get developers to write good code?
How to link the CI/CD toolchain?
How to achieve security?
Observability?

6. 75%
by 2026, 75% of organizations with
platform engineering teams will
provide internal developer portals to
improve developer experience and
accelerate product innovation
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/activity-7112074595469328385-V485
Development Phases:
● Discover and Create
● Integrate and Deploy
● Operate and Improve
Source: Gartner: “Innovation Insight
for Internal Developer Portals”

7. Source: Gartner: “Innovation Insight for Internal Developer Portals”

8. Backstage
Created by Spotify
Open source under CNCF
Key features:
● Software Catalog
● Git integration
● Templates
● TechDocs
https://backstage.io/
Source: Backstage

9. Extensible
Plugins available for popular
tools
Toolkit for creating new
Plugins
Active user community
Connectivity
Provides visibility to the
systems of record
Doesn’t replace them

10. Software Catalog
Component API
Depends on
Resource
Produces
System
PartOf

11. Git integration
Connect to connect to your Org’s
Git-based repo (GitHub, GitLab,
BitBucket)
Add a YAML file descriptor to each
repo so Backstage can match
relationships between “kinds”
Setup processor to ingest data from
repos

12. Templates
Starting point for new application
Opportunity to embed Org’s
standards, best practice and style
guide from the start
Can also link Org’s preferred quality
and monitoring tools

13. Docs-like-code solution built directly into Backstage
Markdown files live together with the code
Techdocs
Source: Backstage

14. Core features as Plugins
Source: Backstage

15. Plugin Marketplace

16. API-related Plugins

17. Backstage Demo

18. What Internal Developer Portals are NOT
API Management Platforms
Source: Gartner, “Innovation Insight for Internal Developer Portals”, https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/4010078
Value Stream Management Platforms
Application Performance Management

19. Warnings
Don’t expect all teams to have the same portal experience
Source: Gartner, “Innovation Insight for Internal Developer Portals”, https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/4010078
Platform Engineering builds, but must involve Developers
Must continually evolve and improve
Must be configured and integrated with existing tools

20. Implementation - establishing a foundation
Discovery Training
Development
Environment
Software
Catalog
Set objectives
Org structure
Identify assets
Data model
Map Org assets
Plan ingestion
Download
Install local
Install server
Connect to Git
File descriptors
Ingest repos
Size the prize
Prioritise
Common
vocabulary
Sandbox for
familiarisation,
experiments
First cut model
of Org in
Backstage
Activities:
Benefits:

21. Building on the foundation
Objective Initiative Activities Result
Developer
onboarding
TechDocs Content into TechDocs
Connect external docs
Productivity Templates Build best practice into
templates
Repair
architectural debt
Quality Audit Install plugins for
quality tools/linters
App performance Observability Install plugins for
monitoring tools

22. Benefits
Quicker developer onboarding
Faster application delivery
Greater standardisation, re-use
Higher visibility
Greater knowledge sharing

23. Where to learn
more…
https://backstage.io
https://blueconnector.co
https://linkedin.com/in/scheelejon

24. Singapore 17-18 April 2024
Apidays is a two-day conference that connects
the humans who connect APIs
Brings together local, regional and international
experts to share how APIs are transforming
business to accelerate economic growth.
Business and Technology tracks, plus deep-dive
workshops
Learn more at:
https://apidays.global/singapore
https://bit.ly/apidaysSG2023videos
OPEN CALL FOR SPEAKERS