Backstage / IDP reference#

Glossary, available templates, and plugins for SKAO’s Internal Developer Platform.

Glossary#

Term	Meaning
Handle	A person’s GitLab username. A catalog `User` entity’s `metadata.name` is always that person’s Handle.
Namespace (project creation)	The GitLab group a new project is created under. The catalog `Group` chosen as this Namespace is also the accountable owner of the project’s catalog entry.
Namespace (core dumps)	The Kubernetes namespace of the pod a crashing process ran in. Unrelated to a catalog entity’s `metadata.namespace`, which groups catalog entities and defaults to `default`.
Core Dump	The artefact captured when a monitored process crashes, stored as a zip in S3. See Reference for the full core dump glossary.

Available templates#

Template	What it does
New SKA GitLab Project	Creates a new `ska-*` GitLab project seeded with the standard README and licence, configures its merge, pipeline, and branch/environment protection settings, and adds up to two maintainers.

Plugins#

Plugin	Purpose
Software Catalog	Lists SKAO’s GitLab projects, groups, and users as browsable entities.
Scaffolder	Runs project-creation templates, including New SKA GitLab Project.
Core Dumps Browser	Browses, filters, and downloads core dump artefacts captured from crashing Kubernetes workloads. See Core dumps.
GitLab repo creation (backend-only)	The scaffolder actions and namespace/maintainer validation behind the New SKA GitLab Project template.
Search	Full-text search across catalog entities.
TechDocs	Configured to display documentation published alongside a catalog entity; treat as not yet confirmed fully wired end-to-end.

Access requirements#

Sign in with a GitLab account that is a member of the ska-telescope/ska-dev group — the IDP restricts catalog sign-in to that group.
Creating a GitLab project through the scaffolder requires no extra GitLab permissions beyond those the template itself configures; the IDP’s own GitLab integration handles project creation on your behalf.

See also#

Reference — Full core dump metadata and coverage reference.
How the IDP works — How the catalog, sign-in, and plugins fit together.