The Development Framework for managing complexity and expanding capabilities
Guidepad is a development framework designed to manage the inherent complexity of modern software systems by treating “systems as data.” It provides a unified approach to defining, building, and deploying software across various environments, expanding capabilities through its data-driven architecture.
Key Concepts and Features
- Platform-as-Data: Guidepad allows you to define and manage your entire platform—including infrastructure, operations, and applications—as data. This enables the creation of reusable control planes and abstracts away environmental differences across cloud, on-premise, and edge deployments.
- Operations Definition: Encapsulates functionality and dynamically routes operation requests. It can automatically generate APIs (REST, GraphQL) and allows for native import of operations into your codebase, streamlining service interaction.
- Dynamic Types: Enables the definition of types as language-agnostic data. This feature allows for the runtime generation of system types, dynamic mapping and migration of data between storage engines, and the enforcement of schemas to adapt rapidly to changes.
- Embedded Workflow Automation: Workflows are defined as data, allowing for the reuse of Guidepad abstractions (operations, environments) to automate repetitive tasks and manage system changes effectively.
- Software as Data: Services and environments are declared as data, with their states managed via “State Plans,” ensuring consistency and auditability.
- Communication Backbone: Provides a native backbone for inter-service messaging, simplifying communication complexities in microservices architectures.
- Extensibility: Features a plugin framework that allows users to extend existing functionality and add new capabilities tailored to their specific needs.
Benefits
- Manages Complexity at Scale: Designed to handle the intricate details of complex systems, providing a systematic way to build, specify, deploy, and maintain them.
- Adaptability & Evolution: By defining systems as data, Guidepad promotes building highly adaptable systems that can evolve with changing requirements.
- Enhanced Observability: Offers “Functional Panes of Glass” where observability is directly linked to data definitions, providing deep insights into system behavior.
- Automated Development Tasks: The WorkPlan system automates tedious tasks, integrating natively with other Guidepad features to streamline operations like schema changes and State Plan executions.
- Improved Consistency: Ensures consistency across environments and applications by enforcing data-driven definitions and workflows.