Registering a Component

Audience: Developers

:::note Note Entity files are stored in YAML format, if you are not familiar with YAML, you can learn more about it here.

Descriptor Format of Catalog Entities provides additional information on the format of the YAML entity files. :::

Overview

This guide will walk you through how to pull Backstage data from other locations manually. There are integrations that will automatically do this for you.

When registering a component, you can:

• Link to an existing entity file: The file is analyzed to determine which entities are defined, and the entities are added to the Scaffolded Backstage App Catalog. For example, https://github.com/backstage/backstage/blob/master/catalog-info.yaml.

• Link to a repository: All catalog-info.yaml files are discovered in the repository and their defined entities are added to the Scaffolded Backstage App Catalog. For example, https://github.com/backstage/backstage.

  :::note Note If no entities are found, a Pull Request is created that adds an example catalog-info.yaml file to the repository. When the Pull Request is merged, the Scaffolded Backstage App Catalog loads all of the defined entities.

  :::

Prerequisites

• You should have already installed a standalone app.

Registering a component

To manually register a component in the Software Catalog:

1. Select Create.

2. Select REGISTER EXISTING COMPONENT.

3. Fill out the template.

   The standalone Backstage application includes one template. For this example, enter the repository URL to the entity file, https://github.com/backstage/backstage/blob/master/catalog-info.yaml. This is used in the Backstage demo site catalog.

4. Select ANALYZE.

5. If the changes from ANALYZE are correct, select IMPORT.

   If your entity was successfully imported, the details will be displayed.

6. Select Home to view your new entity in the Software Catalog.