What Lies Ahead: Platform Engineering Predictions

This blog was originally published in the Typo blog.

As platform engineering continues to evolve, it brings both promising opportunities and potential challenges.

As we look to the future, what changes lie ahead for Platform Engineering? In this blog, we will explore the future landscape of platform engineering and strategize how organizations can stay at the forefront of innovation.

What is Platform Engineering?

Platform Engineering is an emerging technology approach that enables software developers with all the required resources. It acts as a bridge between development and infrastructure which helps in simplifying the complex tasks and enhancing development velocity. The primary goal is to improve developer experience, operational efficiency, and the overall speed of software delivery.

Importance of Platform Engineering

• Platform engineering helps in creating reusable components and standardized processes. It also automates routine tasks, such as deployment, monitoring, and scaling, to speed up the development cycle.
• Platform engineering integrates security measures into the platform to ensure that applications are built and deployed securely. This allows the platform to meet regulatory and compliance requirements.
• It ensures efficient use of resources to balance performance and expenditure. It also provides transparency into resource usage and associated costs to help organizations make informed decisions about scaling and investment.
• By providing tools, frameworks, and services, platform engineering tool empowers developers to build, deploy, and manage applications more effectively.
• A well-engineered platform allows organizations to adapt quickly to market changes, new technologies, and customer needs.

Key Predictions for Platform Engineering

More Focus on Developer Experience

The rise in Platform Engineering will enhance developer experience by creating standard toolchains and workflow. In the coming time, the platform engineering team will work closely with developers to understand what they need to be productive. Moreover, the platform tool will be integrated and closely monitored through DevEx and reports. This will enable developers to work efficiently and focus on the core tasks by automating repetitive tasks, further improving their productivity and satisfaction.

Rise in Internal Developer Platform

Platform engineering is closely associated with the development of IDP. In today’s times, organizations are striving for efficiency, hence, the creation and adoption of internal development platforms will rise. This will streamline operations, provide a standardized way of deploying and managing applications, and reduce cognitive load. Hence, reducing time to market for new features and products, allowing developers to focus on delivering high-quality products more efficiently rather than managing infrastructure.

Growing Trend of Ephemeral Environment

Modern software development demands rapid iteration. The ephemeral environments, temporary, ideal environments, will be an effective way to test new features and bugs before they are merged into the main codebase. These environments will prioritize speed, flexibility, and cost efficiency. Since they are created on-demand and short-lived, they will align perfectly with modern development practices.

Integration with Generative AI

As times are changing, AI-driven tools become more prevalent. These Generative AI tools such as GitHub Copilot and Google Gemini will enhance capabilities such as infrastructure as code, governance as code, and security as code. This will not only automate manual tasks but also support smoother operations and improved documentation processes. Hence, driving innovation and automating dev workflow.

Extension to DevOps

Platform engineering is a natural extension of DevOps. In the future, the platform engineers will work alongside DevOps rather than replacing it to address its complexities and scalability challenges. This will provide a standardized and automated approach to software development and deployment leading to faster project initialization, reduced lead time, and increased productivity.

Shift to Product-Centric Funding Model

Software organizations are now shifting from project project-centric model towards product product-centric funding model. When platforms are fully-fledged products, they serve internal customers and require a thoughtful and user-centric approach in their ongoing development. It also aligns well with the product lifecycle that is ongoing and continuous which enhances innovation and reduces operational friction. It will also decentralize decision making which allows platform engineering leaders to make and adjust funding decisions for their teams.

Why Staying Updated on Platform Engineering Trends is Crucial?

• Platform Engineering is a relatively new and evolving field. Hence, platform engineering teams need to keep up with rapid tech changes and ensure the platform remains robust and efficient.
• Emerging technologies such as serverless computers and edge computers will shape the future of platform engineering. Moreover, Artificial intelligence and machine learning also help in optimizing various aspects of software development such as testing and monitoring.
• Platform engineering trends are introducing new ways to automate processes, manage infrastructure, and optimize workflows. This enables organizations to streamline operations, reduce manual work, and focus on more strategic tasks, leading to enhanced developer productivity.
• A platform aims to deliver a superior user experience. When platform engineers stay ahead of the learning curve, they can implement features and improvements that improve the end-user experience, resulting in higher customer satisfaction and retention.
• Trends in platform engineering highlight new methods for building scalable and flexible systems. It allows platform engineers to design platforms that can easily adapt to changing demands and scale without compromising performance.

Typo — An Effective Platform Engineering Tool

Typo is an effective software engineering intelligence platform that offers SDLC visibility, developer insights, and workflow automation to build better programs faster. It can seamlessly integrate into tech tool stacks such as GIT versioning, issue tracker, and CI/CD tools.

It also offers comprehensive insights into the deployment process through key metrics such as change failure rate, time to build, and deployment frequency. Moreover, its automated code tool helps identify issues in the code and auto-fixes them before you merge to master.

Typo has an effective sprint analysis feature that tracks and analyzes the team’s progress throughout a sprint. Besides this, It also provides 360 views of the developer experience i.e. captures qualitative insights and provides an in-depth view of the real issues.

Learn More About Typo

Conclusion

The future of platform engineering is both exciting and dynamic. As this field continues to evolve, staying ahead of these developments is crucial for organizations aiming to maintain a competitive edge. By embracing these predictions and proactively adapting to changes, platform engineering teams can drive innovation, improve efficiency, and deliver high-quality products that meet the demands of an ever-changing tech landscape.