Anant Platform Playbook

Anant Corporation logo

At Anant, we've been building business platforms since 2010, and these days we have focused on realtime data & analytics platforms that connect to other aspects of a comprehensive modern enterprise's business platform. We've worked on platforms of all sizes: small, medium, large, and even extra-extra-large. We started this playbook to train our team but want to share this as a set of best practices for creating, maintaining, and operating a modern enterprise business platform with a realtime data & analytics platform connecting it all. We present them as 15 Plays, broken out into three categories, in a format inspired by the Twelve Factor App, USDS Playbook, and Principled GraphQL.

Platform Principles logoPlatform Principles

A framework & approach to creating a platform that scales.


1. Contexts

Contexts - People, processes, information, platforms, in that order.

2. Responsibility

The people, processes, information, and systems overlap across responsibility areas in an organization.

3. Approach

Having an approach allows us to manage systems long term.

4. Framework

Having a framework allows us to use the best practices but the freedom to switch things out.

5. Tools

Templates and tools help us save time and be consistent.

Framework Principles logoFramework Principles

Use the technologies of the modern enterprise.


6. Distributed

All components should be distributed so that it can scale and be available, all the time, to all users.

7. Realtime

All components should be realtime or reactive platforms.

8. Extendable

All components should be extendable and not closed.

9. Automated

All operations with data and dev should automated.

10. Monitored

All systems should be monitored with metrics and logging.

Approach Principles logoApproach Principles

Platform management means people & technology management.


11. Setup

Setup procedures should be documented, scripted, and then automated.

12. Training

Training materials should available or referenced in a central place.

13. Administration

All administrative operations should be documented, scripted, and then automated.

14. Customization

All customization or special configuration should be documented, and part of an automated devops process.

15. Knowledge

All knowledge should be kept up to date as part of each sprint.

Written by Rahul Singh