Building Developer Platforms

What you will be able to do

• Map an internal developer platform onto a reference architecture and explain what each plane owns.
• Justify platform investment in cognitive-load and developer-experience terms, not just tooling.
• Design golden infrastructure modules with clean inputs, semantic versioning, and automated tests.
• Extend Kubernetes with custom resources, operators, and GitOps so infrastructure reconciles from declared state.
• Model a software catalog with clear service ownership in a developer portal such as Backstage.
• Ship paved-road templates that scaffold a new service already wired to CI/CD, docs, and standards.
• Build self-service provisioning that takes a developer from request to a running environment without a ticket.
• Enforce guardrails with policy-as-code, RBAC, and drift control so self-service stays safe and compliant.

What is inside

4 modules, 8 lessons. Each module ends in a graded quiz and most carry an assignment.

1. 01

   Platform as a Product

   Internal developer platforms rise or fall on one idea: run the platform as a product for real developer users, not as a ticket queue. This module explains why IDPs exist, maps the five-plane reference architecture, and adopts the operating model that keeps a platform alive.

   2 lessons · 5 quiz questions

2. 02

   Infrastructure Modules and the Kubernetes Substrate

   Everything a platform provisions sits on a foundation of reusable infrastructure and a control plane that keeps declared state true. This module builds both. First you turn copy-pasted Terraform into golden modules with clean, validated inputs, semantic versioning your consumers can trust, and an automated test suite that runs on every pull request. Then you extend Kubernetes from a container scheduler into a general-purpose control plane, using CRDs, operators, Crossplane, and GitOps so infrastructure and workloads reconcile continuously from state declared in Git. The result is a resource plane other teams consume by applying a small manifest, never by copying your HCL by hand.

   2 lessons · 5 quiz questions · assignment

3. 03

   The Developer Portal and Paved Roads

   Give developers one place to find, own, and create services. You model a software catalog in a developer portal like Backstage with clear ownership, then turn your standards into paved-road templates so a new service starts compliant, wired to CI/CD, and documented from its first commit. The through-line: paved roads work only when they are the easiest path a developer can take.

   2 lessons · 5 quiz questions

4. 04

   Self-Service Provisioning and Guardrails

   Close the loop from a developer request to running infrastructure with no human in the ticket queue. You wire self-service provisioning through a request surface, workload specifications, and an orchestration engine, then hold the line with guardrails: policy-as-code, least-privilege RBAC, and drift control, so speed never costs you security or standards.

   2 lessons · 5 quiz questions · assignment