Catalog Entity Guide

Required Fields

Every entity must have:

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1   # always this exact value
kind: Component                      # see Entity Types in service-catalog.md
metadata:
  name: my-service                   # lowercase, hyphen-separated
spec:
  owner: group:org/team-name        # "group:" prefix required
  lifecycle: experimental            # starting state

Component

Use for services, libraries, jobs, CLIs, or websites.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: Component
metadata:
  name: payment-api
  description: "Stripe-compatible payment processing for checkout flows."
  tags:
    - go
    - grpc
  annotations:
    wxops.cloud/scaffold-template: go-grpc-service
    wxops.cloud/scaffold-date: "2025-06-10"
    wxops.cloud/gitea-repo: wxops/payment-api
    wxops.cloud/vault-path: wxops/payment-api/dev
    wxops.cloud/lifecycle: development
spec:
  type: service           # service | library | website | tool | database | pipeline | ML model
  lifecycle: development
  owner: group:wxops/rocket-team
  system: payments
  providesApis:
    - payment-api-v1
  dependsOn:
    - resource:payment-db
    - component:identity-service
  consumesApis:
    - notification-api-v1

wxops.cloud/ annotations reference

Annotation	Required	Description
wxops.cloud/scaffold-template	No	Template ID used to create this service
wxops.cloud/scaffold-date	No	ISO date when scaffold was run
wxops.cloud/gitea-repo	No	org/repo for repo links and CI/CD card
wxops.cloud/vault-path	No	org/appName/env — Vault KV path prefix. Never exposes secrets.
wxops.cloud/lifecycle	No	Current lifecycle override (also in spec.lifecycle)

API

Use for OpenAPI, gRPC, GraphQL, or async APIs.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: API
metadata:
  name: payment-api-v1
  description: "gRPC API for payment operations."
  annotations:
    wxops.cloud/gitea-repo: wxops/payment-api
    wxops.cloud/openapi-path: api/openapi.yaml    # relative path in repo
spec:
  type: openapi         # openapi | grpc | graphql | asyncapi
  lifecycle: development
  owner: group:wxops/rocket-team
  system: payments
  definition: |
    openapi: "3.0.0"
    info:
      title: Payment API
      version: "1.0.0"
    paths: {}

When wxops.cloud/openapi-path is set, the portal fetches the spec from Gitea at render time and shows an interactive Swagger UI on the API detail page.

Resource

Use for databases, object stores, queues, Vault paths, or external services.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: Resource
metadata:
  name: payment-db
  description: "PostgreSQL for payments bounded context."
  annotations:
    wxops.cloud/vault-path: wxops/payment-api/dev
spec:
  type: database        # database | s3 | queue | messaging | cache | external-service
  lifecycle: development
  owner: group:wxops/rocket-team
  system: payments
  dependsOn:
    - component:payment-api

vault-path naming

The portal derives appName from the vault-path annotation using segment [1] (org/appName/env). Resource entities are named {appName}-vault in the catalog — never use entity.metadata.name to look up the Vault path.

System

A logical product boundary that groups related Components and APIs.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: System
metadata:
  name: payments
  description: "End-to-end payment processing platform."
spec:
  owner: group:wxops/rocket-team
  domain: ecommerce

Group

A team or org unit. Gitea org/teams become Groups automatically via the {org}:{team} → group:{org}/{team} mapping.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: Group
metadata:
  name: rocket-team
  description: "Payment and checkout domain team."
spec:
  type: team            # team | department | organization | temporary
  profile:
    displayName: "Rocket Team"
    email: rocket-team@example.com
  parent: wxops
  children: []
  members:
    - user:alice
    - user:bob

User

A team member. Pinniped sessions produce an email claim — the portal strips @domain to get the username for catalog entity references.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: User
metadata:
  name: alice                    # email prefix, not full email
  description: "Backend engineer on Rocket Team."
spec:
  profile:
    displayName: "Alice Smith"
    email: alice@example.com
    picture: https://avatars.example.com/alice
  memberOf:
    - group:wxops/rocket-team

Document

An RFC, ADR, or Runbook linked to a Component.

apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: Doc
metadata:
  name: rfc-001-payment-retry-strategy
  description: "Retry strategy for payment gateway failures."
  annotations:
    wxops.cloud/gitea-repo: wxops/payment-api
    wxops.cloud/doc-path: docs/rfcs/001-retry-strategy.md
spec:
  docType: rfc           # rfc | adr | runbook | documentation
  lifecycle: active
  owner: group:wxops/rocket-team
  system: payments
  relatedTo:
    - component:payment-api

The kind: value is Doc — the portal's UI labels this kind "Document" (the register-entity-form dropdown, the catalog filter), but the field written to the YAML file itself is the shorter Doc. docType is also its own field, distinct from the generic spec.type used by Component/API/Resource — a Doc entity with type: instead of docType: fails validation with missing spec.docType.

The portal fetches the Markdown from Gitea and renders it on the entity page with syntax highlighting and Mermaid diagram support.

Common Mistakes

Mistake	Correct form
owner: rocket-team	owner: group:wxops/rocket-team
dependsOn: payment-db	dependsOn: - resource:payment-db
Naming a Resource entity payment-api-vault	Entity name in catalog can be anything; Vault path is derived from the annotation
Exposing gitops-infra PR URLs in descriptions	PR links to gitops-infra are internal — use titles/status only
kind: Document / spec.type: rfc on a Doc entity	kind: Doc, spec.docType: rfc — Doc is its own kind with its own docType field, not the generic type Component/API/Resource use