CONQUERING COMPLEXITY FOR HAPPY DEVELOPERS

Imagine this: you're a developer, buzzing with ideas for incredible software. DevOps, a development approach that's all about collaboration and automation, lets you turn those ideas into reality. You get to own your code from start to finish, building it and ensuring it runs smoothly – it's empowering! DevOps promises fast lead times to production and happy users.

All problems solved, right? 

Well, not quite... 

DEVOPS: THE DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD

While DevOps brings ownership and pride, it also expands your responsibilities. Suddenly, you're expected to understand complex things like infrastructure, deployment pipelines, and development and monitoring tools.

This can be overwhelming! Juggling all these tools and remembering how to use them creates a mental burden, slowing you down and increasing the risk of mistakes and team burn-out.

APPLY SCALE: GET READY FOR DISASTER 

Now, imagine your development teams grow, and your software breaks down into smaller, independent services (microservices). This is great for flexibility, but it scatters information even further. Suddenly, you are facing new challenges:

Constant Interruptions: People move between teams, new developers join, and knowledge gaps appear. You're constantly switching tasks and explaining things, hindering productivity. 

Information Overload: Finding the information you need, feels like searching for a needle in a haystack. You might not even know who to ask for help!

INTRODUCING HYPERHUB: YOUR ONE-STOP DEVOPS SHOP

Here at Essent, we understand these struggles. That's why we decided to introduce our own developer portal, HyperHub.

Adding yet another application might seem strange but hear us out. Many companies, even tech giants like Spotify, have faced these same DevOps challenges at scale. That's why Spotify created Backstage, an open-source framework for building developer portals that simplifies DevOps by bringing everything together. 

HyperHub leverages Backstage's core functionality and tailors it specifically to address Essent's unique needs and empowers our development teams to thrive.

BACKSTAGE: THE HERO BEHIND HYPERHUB

Think of Backstage as your central hub for all things development. Here is how it helps:

Less Brain Work: No more hunting for the right tool! Backstage provides a One-Stop DevOps Shop, an entry point for everything we need.

Easy Sharing and Discovery: Find and use shared services and components from our colleagues – building on each other's work becomes a breeze!

A Personalized Dashboard: Connect Backstage to our existing tools (like those fancy CI/CD pipelines) to see everything we need in one place. Plus, a powerful search function helps us find what we're looking for quickly.

Open-Source Power: Since Backstage is open source, many companies contribute to it, offering a vast library of helpful plugins. Essent is proud to be one of those contributors, ensuring Backstage continues to evolve and meet the needs of the developer community.

HYPERHUB: BUILT FOR YOU, BUILT BY YOU!

HyperHub takes Backstage's power a step further, specifically tailored for our organizations needs. As an inner-source project, HyperHub is not solely developed by one team. This means ideas and contributions are not only welcomed but encouraged!

Here is how HyperHub empowers our development teams:

Automated Workflows: Say goodbye to repetitive tasks! 

HyperHub offers pre-built workflows that guide us through common processes such as introducing a new application in a mono-repo.

Self-Service Power: Get things done independently!

HyperHub provides building blocks that allow us to complete tasks without needing constant help like requesting access to applications or creating service requests for our cloud team.

Streamlined Development: Hello information!

Easily access all the documentation, code libraries, and APIs we need, right within the software catalog.

Fast Track Onboarding: Hit the ground running!

Access onboarding documentation and information on the tech stacks, frameworks and tools that are used in our tech-radar.

By using HyperHub, we can ditch the information overload and focus on what we do best: building fantastic software!