All Posts - Paul Escarcena | DevOps & Cloud Blog

Backstage: Golden Paths, RBAC and Controlling Who Deploys Where

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Set up Golden Paths in Backstage to standardize deployments, enable RBAC for access control, and restrict who can deploy to each Kubernetes namespace.

Ollama on Kubernetes: Deploy Your Local LLM on a Real Cluster

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Deploy Ollama on Kubernetes step by step: resources, HPA, GPU, OrbStack for local development, and what's missing to take an LLM to production with observability and security.

Backstage Series #3: Integrate GitHub, ArgoCD, and Kubernetes in Your Portal

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Connect Backstage with GitHub, ArgoCD, and Kubernetes using official plugins. Close the full GitOps loop: from a form to automatic deployment in your cluster.

ArgoCD: GitOps on Your Kubernetes Cluster Step by Step

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Install ArgoCD on your local cluster, deploy your first app with GitOps, explore alternatives, and understand why the repository should be your source of truth.

Backstage Series #2: Generate Kubernetes Manifests and Create PRs from Your Portal

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Learn how to integrate Backstage with Kubernetes, generate manifests (Deployment, HPA, Service) from a Software Template, and submit them as a Pull Request to your config repo.

Ollama + Python and Node.js: Build Your Own Local AI Chat

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Mon, 12 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Build a ChatGPT-like app step by step that runs 100% on your machine using Ollama, with examples in Python (FastAPI) and Node.js (Express), Tailwind CSS v4, and real-time streaming.

Ollama: Run AI Models on Your Machine Without the Cloud

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Learn what Ollama is, which models you can use, why running an LLM locally makes sense, and how to do it step by step on macOS, Windows, and Linux.

Backstage Series #1: Getting Started with Backstage

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

A friendly introduction to Backstage, Spotify's developer portal. Learn what it is, how to install it, and why you should consider it.

Kubernetes in Practice: Deploying Python and Java Apps with Metrics, HPA, and Grafana

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Mon, 29 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Put everything you've learned to the test: deploy two real APIs (Python and Java) on Kubernetes with Prometheus metrics, autoscaling with HPA, and monitoring in Grafana.

Kubernetes: Observability with Prometheus and Grafana

paul.escarcena@gmail.com (Paul Escarcena) — Sun, 28 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Learn what Prometheus and Grafana are, how they complement each other, how they collect metrics, and how to set them up in your Kubernetes cluster with Kind step by step.