This backend allows to save user specific settings. All requests need to be authorized, as the user identifier (userEntityRef) is resolved using the authorization token.

Setup backend

Install the backend plugin

# From your Backstage root directory
yarn --cwd packages/backend add @backstage/plugin-user-settings-backend

New backend

Add the plugin to your backend in packages/backend/src/index.ts:

backend.add(import('@backstage/plugin-user-settings-backend/alpha'));

To get real-time updates of the user settings across different user sessions, you must also install the @backstage/plugin-signals-backend plugin.

Old backend

Configure the routes by adding a new userSettings.ts file in packages/backend/src/plugins/:

// packages/backend/src/plugins/userSettings.ts
import { createRouter } from '@backstage/plugin-user-settings-backend';
import { PluginEnvironment } from '../types';

export default async function createPlugin(env: PluginEnvironment) {
  return await createRouter({
    database: env.database,
    identity: env.identity,
  });
}

Add the new routes to your backend by modifying packages/backend/src/index.ts:

 // packages/backend/src/index.ts
+import userSettings from './plugins/userSettings';
 async function main() {
+  const userSettingsEnv = useHotMemoize(module, () => createEnv('user-settings'));
   const apiRouter = Router();
+  apiRouter.use('/user-settings', await userSettings(userSettingsEnv));
}

Setup app

To make use of the user settings backend, replace the WebStorage with the UserSettingsStorage by using the storageApiRef.

 // packages/app/src/apis.ts
 import {
   AnyApiFactory,
   createApiFactory,
+  discoveryApiRef,
+  fetchApiRef,
   errorApiRef,
+  identityApiRef,
+  storageApiRef,
 } from '@backstage/core-plugin-api';
+import { UserSettingsStorage } from '@backstage/plugin-user-settings';
+import { signalApiRef } from '@backstage/plugin-signals-react';

 export const apis: AnyApiFactory[] = [
+  createApiFactory({
+    api: storageApiRef,
+    deps: {
+      discoveryApi: discoveryApiRef,
+      errorApi: errorApiRef,
+      fetchApi: fetchApiRef,
+      identityApi: identityApiRef,
+      signalApi: signalApiRef, // Optional
+    },
+    factory: deps => UserSettingsStorage.create(deps),
+  }),
 ];

Development

Use yarn start to start the local dev environment. To simplify the access to the API, the token will automatically be set to user:default/john_doe.

You can change the user by setting a custom Authorization header. To keep things simple, the raw Bearer value will directly be used as user.

Example:

curl --request GET 'http://localhost:7007/user-settings' --header 'Authorization: Bearer user:default/custom-user'