platform-engineering

# Platform Engineering

## Purpose

Build Internal Developer Platforms (IDPs) that provide self-service infrastructure, reduce cognitive load, and accelerate developer productivity through golden paths and platform-as-product thinking.

Platform engineering represents the evolution beyond traditional DevOps, focusing on creating product-quality internal platforms that treat developers as customers. The discipline addresses the developer productivity crisis where engineers spend 30-40% of time on infrastructure and tooling instead of features.

## When to Use This Skill

Trigger this skill when:
- Building or improving an internal developer platform
- Designing a developer portal (Backstage, Port, or commercial IDP)
- Implementing golden paths and software templates
- Establishing or restructuring a platform engineering team
- Measuring and improving developer experience (DevEx)
- Integrating IDP with infrastructure, CI/CD, observability, or security tools
- Driving platform adoption across an engineering organization
- Assessing platform maturity and identifying capability gaps

## Core Concepts

### Platform as Product

Treat internal platforms with the same rigor as customer-facing products:

**Product Management Approach:**
- Define platform vision, strategy, and roadmap
- Identify developer "customers" and their pain points
- Measure success via adoption metrics, satisfaction surveys, and business impact
- Iterate based on feedback loops and usage analytics
- Balance new capabilities with platform reliability and support

**Key Differences from Traditional DevOps:**
- DevOps focuses on delivery pipelines; platform engineering builds comprehensive developer experiences
- Platform teams operate as product teams (product managers, UX designers, engineers)
- Success measured by developer productivity and satisfaction, not just infrastructure metrics
- Self-service is the primary interface, not ticket queues

### Internal Developer Platform (IDP) Architecture

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