Backstage v1.44.0 drops, and many plugins have new features added

It appears there has been a recent flurry of activity and discussions around Backstage, Spotify’s open-source developer portal. Several articles and announcements highlight its role in enhancing developer experience, new integrations, and ongoing platform evolution.

PagerDuty Unveils End-to-End AI Agent Suite with Backstage Integration

PagerDuty recently announced the launch of its end-to-end AI agent suite, featuring over 150 enhancements and deep integrations with various tools, including Backstage. This new suite aims to leverage AI to improve incident resolution times and reduce on-call fatigue. The integration with Backstage suggests a move towards embedding AI-driven incident management capabilities directly within the developer portal, enabling more streamlined operations and potentially automated responses to system alerts.

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Backstage v1.44.0 Release Notes

The Backstage Software Catalog and Developer Platform has announced the release of version 1.44.0, bringing several updates and improvements. Key changes include the removal of the built-in CssBaseline from UnifiedThemeProvider, requiring users to manually import @backstage/ui/css/styles.css for proper styling. Additionally, a new --entrypoint option has been added to the package start command in the Backstage CLI, allowing for custom entry directories for development applications. A notable new plugin called “Themer” has also been introduced, designed to assist with Material UI to Backstage UI migration.

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Breaking Changes

• Remove Backstage UI ScrollArea component for accessibility reasons. #31409 by @cdedreuille, merged 1 day ago
• Remove Backstage UI Icon component to reduce bundle size and stabilize the API. #31407 by @cdedreuille, merged 1 day ago

Features

• Add Backstage UI Dialog component with header body footer and closer. #31371 by @ssjoblad, merged 2 days ago
• Add virtualization to UI menus via virtualized prop plus maxWidth and maxHeight for long lists. #31375 by @cdedreuille, merged 6 days ago
• Allow Box Container Flex Grid GridItem to pass data attributes to rendered elements. #31374 by @vinzscam, merged 6 days ago
• Add sentry fetch dsn action in scaffolder backend Sentry module to output a project DSN. #31046 by @brentswisher, merged 2 days ago
• Add support in the yarn plugin for a custom Backstage manifest location via env vars for restricted networks. #31122 by @drodil, merged 1 day ago (active discussion)

Bug Fixes

• Fix scaffolder form handling of RJSF allOf oneOf anyOf when using nested conditions at the step root. #31382 by @iainvdw, merged today
• Fix NotFound page rendering when a page extension is mounted at root slash. #31353 by @vinzscam, merged 2 days ago
• Fix default text color in Backstage UI. #31429 by @cdedreuille, merged today
• Fix default font weight and family in Backstage UI. #31432 by @cdedreuille, merged today
• Fix default font size in Backstage UI. #31435 by @cdedreuille, merged today
• Fix table sort icon position and visibility on hover in Backstage UI. #31393 by @cdedreuille, merged 2 days ago
• Fix scroll jumping when opening UI menus by avoiding modal body scroll lock. #31394 by @cdedreuille, merged 2 days ago
• Fix missing Backstage UI CSS in the dev app in dev utils. #31428 by @Rugvip, merged today
• Fix discovery of distributed actions in scaffolder backend on startup. #31244 by @drodil, merged 1 day ago

Improvements

• Update React Aria in Backstage UI to 1.13.0 with many small fixes. #31367 by @cdedreuille, merged 6 days ago
• Add CSS layers to Backstage UI to make custom CSS override defaults more predictably. #31362 by @cdedreuille, merged 6 days ago
• Convert Backstage UI components to CSS Modules while keeping theming class names. #31399 by @cdedreuille, merged 2 days ago
• Improve Backstage UI styles props across components and simplify internal styling. #31404 by @cdedreuille, merged 2 days ago
• Remove MUICssBaseline to avoid conflicts with Backstage UI styles and align resets. #31365 by @cdedreuille, merged 6 days ago

Developer Experience

• Relax ESLint rules to allow frontend plugins to import from other frontend plugins with the same plugin id for overrides without warnings. #31373 by @drodil, merged 5 days ago
• Deduplicate imports in generated OpenAPI clients in repo tools. #31297 by @rferreira98, merged 6 days ago (active discussion)
• Add renderTestApp to frontend test utils for the new routing system with extensions. #31353 by @vinzscam, merged 2 days ago

Documentation

• Fix monospace font reference in docs. #31364 by @vinzscam, merged 7 days ago
• Tidy docs including a catalog config key correction. #31426 by @freben, merged today

Reverts

• Revert user settings storage api blueprint for NFS since it replaced storageApiRef incorrectly. #31431 by @benjdlambert, merged today referencing #31413

Hetzner Cloud Plugin

• Features Show CPU architecture in the UI merged 5 days ago
• Features Return server architecture in the API merged 5 days ago
• Documentation Fix dev setup instructions merged 5 days ago

Tech Insights Plugin

• Features Show multiple links on MaturityScorePage PR #5126 merged today
• Features Show error info when a check fails and the fact type is not boolean PR #5126 merged today
• Features Tweak maturity accordion summary layout PR #5126 merged today
• Bug Fixes Use the core Accordion to resolve layout issues PR #5126 merged today
• Documentation Fix a readme typo PR #5126 merged today

Pipelines with Tekton Plugin

• Features Show pipeline run params and results PR #5642 merged 2 days ago

Announcements Plugin

• Features Add updated at field so the banner shows the most recent announcement PR #5595 merged 6 days ago

Entity Validation Plugin

• Features Add support for the new frontend system PR #5222 merged 5 days ago

Q&A Plugin

• Features Support mermaid in markdown content merged 5 days ago
• Features Allow passing markdown plugins through props merged 2 days ago
• Features Allow moderators to change post authors merged 2 days ago
• Features Allow moderators to change answer authors merged 2 days ago
• Features Improve user and entity search by limiting fetched fields merged 1 day ago
• Bug Fixes Fix scaffolder import merged today
• Bug Fixes Sort entities and tags in inputs merged 1 day ago
• Bug Fixes Show loading state correctly in the posts table merged 1 day ago
• Bug Fixes Fix posts container props merged 2 days ago
• Bug Fixes Restore user field for metadata input merged 2 days ago
• Bug Fixes Use display name for user groups when available merged 5 days ago
• Documentation Add links to available plugins merged 2 days ago

Toolbox Plugin

• Features Improve overall layout merged today
• Breaking Changes Roll back to MUI four for compatibility merged today
• Bug Fixes Remove input debounce that caused slow updates merged today
• Bug Fixes Add a small input delay to improve typing UX merged today

Kubernetes Ingestor Plugin

• Bug Fixes Fix custom annotation handling merged today
• Bug Fixes Fix system reference namespace mappings merged today
• Bug Fixes Fix name and title mapping use in components merged today

Crossplane Plugin

• Features Export the API ref and client for integrators merged today
• Bug Fixes Fix the API ref export merged 6 days ago

Nobl9 Plugin

• Security Fix on headers vulnerability merged 5 days ago

Application Topology for Kubernetes Plugin

• Maintenance Move status components and related hooks into the plugin PR #5668 merged today