Red Hat Summit Red Hat SummitSupportConsoleDevelopersStart a trialContact

Chapter 2. Centralizing your software components in the Red Hat Developer Hub catalog for easier access

The Red Hat Developer Hub Software Catalog is a centralized system that gives you visibility into all the software across your ecosystem, including services, websites, libraries, and data pipelines. You can use it to view ownership details and metadata for each component in one place.

The metadata for the components in your Software Catalog is stored as YAML files that live alongside your code in your version control system. The version control repositories can include one or many metadata files. Software Catalog organizes items as entities, which include Components, Resources, and APIs, and other related types. Each entity includes associated metadata such as its owner, type, and other relevant details.

By storing metadata in YAML files alongside the code, you allow Red Hat Developer Hub to process and display this information through a clear, visual interface. With the Software Catalog, you can manage and maintain your software, stay aware of all software available in your ecosystem, and take ownership of your services and tools.

The Overview page for a component provides key information such as links to the source code, documentation, dependencies, and ownership details. You can customize this page with plugins to suit specific needs.

Prerequisites

Procedure

You can add components to your RHDH instance using the following methods:

  • Register components manually using the GUI or by using your app-config.yaml with the required permissions.
  • Create new components by using Software Templates.
  • Use the bulk import plugin with the required permissions. For more information, see Bulk importing GitHub repositories.

You can create new components in the Software Catalog in your RHDH instance. Red Hat Developer Hub automatically registers all components that developers or platform engineers create using Templates in the Software Catalog.

Prerequisites

Procedure

  1. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, click Catalog.
  2. On the Catalog page, click Self-service.

To manually register components in your RHDH instance, create a catalog-info.yaml file and register it with your Red Hat Developer Hub instance. The catalog-info.yaml file contains the metadata you wish to register for your software component.

Prerequisites

Procedure

  1. In the root directory of your software project, create a file named catalog-info.yaml. 

    apiVersion: backstage.io/v1alpha1
kind: Component
metadata:
    name: _<your_software_component>_
    description: _<software_component_brief_description>_
    tags:
         - example
         - service
    annotations:
         github.com/project-slug: _<repo_link_of_your_component_to_register>_
spec:
    type: _<your_service>_
    owner: _<your_team_name>_
    lifecycle: _<your_lifecycle>_
  2. Commit the catalog-info.yaml file to the root of your project source code repository.
  3. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, go to Catalog > Self-service.
  4. On the Self-service page, click Register Existing Component.
  5. On the Register an existing component page, enter the full URL of the catalog-info.yaml file in your repository. For example: Artist lookup component.
  6. Complete the wizard instructions.

Verification

  • Your software component is listed in the Software Catalog. You can view its details and ensure all the metadata is accurate.

You can update components in the Software Catalog in your Red Hat Developer Hub instance.

Prerequisites

Procedure

To update components in the Software Catalog in your Red Hat Developer Hub instance, complete the following steps:

  1. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, click Catalog.

  2. Find the software component that you want to edit, under Actions, click the Edit icon.

    Note

    This action redirects you to the YAML file on GitHub.

  3. On your remote repository UI, update your YAML file.

    Note

    After you merge your changes, the updated metadata in the Software Catalog appears after some time.

Procedure

  1. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, click Catalog.
  2. On the Catalog page, click the Kind drop-down list.

  3. Select the type of Kind you want to filter.

    Note

    The available filter dropdowns vary based on the Kind you select, displaying options relevant to that specific entity type.

Procedure

  1. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, click Catalog.
  2. In the Search box, enter the text you want to use to filter the components.

You can view the Software Catalog YAML file in your Red Hat Developer Hub instance. The YAML file displays the metadata for the components in your Software Catalog.

Procedure

To view the Software Catalog YAML file in your Red Hat Developer Hub instance, complete the following steps:

  1. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, click Catalog.

  2. Find the software component that you want to view, under Actions, click the View icon.

    Note

    These steps redirect you to the YAML file on your remote repository.

You can use the Add to favorites icon to add the software catalogs that you visit regularly to the Starred category.

Procedure

To quickly access the Software Catalogs that you visit regularly, complete the following steps:

  1. In your Red Hat Developer Hub navigation menu, click Catalog.
  2. Find the software component that you want to add as a favorite, under Actions, click the Add to favorites icon.

Verification

  • The starred component is listed under Your Starred Entities on your Home page.
Red Hat logoGithubredditYoutubeTwitter

Learn

Try, buy, & sell

Communities

About Red Hat Documentation

We help Red Hat users innovate and achieve their goals with our products and services with content they can trust. Explore our recent updates.

Making open source more inclusive

Red Hat is committed to replacing problematic language in our code, documentation, and web properties. For more details, see the Red Hat Blog.

About Red Hat

We deliver hardened solutions that make it easier for enterprises to work across platforms and environments, from the core datacenter to the network edge.

Theme

© 2026 Red HatBack to top