COSCUP 2024

Crossplane, a CNCF Incubating project, has simplified how organizations build and manage their cloud infrastructure. Crossplane empowers teams to create internal platforms tailored to their specific needs by enabling the composition of cloud resources and services into platform APIs. In this talk, we will explore the evolution of Crossplane, the benefits of a control plane approach, and how it streamlines the development of internal developer platforms (IDPs).

We will begin by tracing the journey of Crossplane from its inception to its current state as a CNCF Incubating project. The talk will highlight the key milestones and innovations that have shaped Crossplane's development, showcasing its growing maturity and industry adoption.

Next, we will explore the advantages of embracing the control plane approach for building IDPs. By leveraging the familiar Kubernetes API for infrastructure management, Crossplane enables developers to consume infrastructure resources using the same declarative approach they are accustomed to for application deployment. This consistency simplifies the learning curve and promotes a unified experience across the development lifecycle.

The talk's core will focus on Crossplane internals and how they facilitate the composition of infrastructure and services. We will explore the key concepts, such as providers, managed resources, and compositions, and demonstrate how they create a powerful platform API. Through practical examples, attendees will gain a solid understanding of Crossplane's architecture and its potential for simplifying infrastructure management.

Finally, we will guide attendees on how to get started with developing their compositions using Crossplane. We will walk through the process of composing resources, creating custom APIs, and integrating them into an IDP. By the end of the talk, attendees will have a clear roadmap for leveraging Crossplane to build robust and scalable internal platforms.