FAQ

What is Strata?

A modular-monolith backend framework for admin products: RBAC, operations tooling, notifications, SSO (OIDC/SAML), SCIM provisioning, an optional AI domain, a plugin SPI, and a React admin console — one deployable Spring Boot application. Module boundaries are enforced by Maven modules, ArchUnit rules and a Spring Modulith module-graph gate that run in public CI.

Is this related to OpenGamma's Strata?

No. OpenGamma's Strata is a market-risk/pricing library. This project is an unrelated modular-monolith admin framework; the shared word is a dictionary collision.

Which Java version do I need?

Build with JDK 25 (the only build toolchain); the published artifacts target Java 21 bytecode, so applications can run on Java 21+. CI starts the built minimal application on a Java 21 runtime on every push.

Where can I try it?

Hosted evaluation instance: https://demo.simplecharlie.dev (admin / admin123; shared, data resets periodically — do not store anything real). Locally: git clone … && docker compose up --build → http://localhost:3001.

Why a modular monolith instead of microservices?

Admin/ops products rarely need distributed transactions or independent scaling per domain. A single deployable with enforced seams keeps the operational surface small while still allowing a module to be extracted later. There is no service discovery, gateway, Feign or K8s-first deployment in the supported surface.

Do I have to use the shipped admin console?

No. The backend is framework-first; the React admin console is included as a reference UI. Every resource is a plain REST endpoint with OpenAPI documentation, so any frontend (or another admin template) can consume it.

Why MUI rather than Tailwind / shadcn?

The admin console prioritises dense, data-heavy screens and accessibility-tested primitives; MUI 9 is the single UI dependency and is wrapped behind components/ui so it can be replaced page by page. The backend framework makes no UI choice for you.

Is there an enterprise edition?

Community is Apache-2.0: the framework, starter, plugin SPI, admin console and examples in this repository. Business verticals (the private product, compliance/KYC/AML and payment surfaces) are not part of this repository and no SaaS lock-in is implied. Editions are documented in the root README.

Can I use it commercially?

Yes, under Apache License 2.0. Keep the NOTICE file and the licence notices. No contributor licence agreement is required; contributions use a DCO sign-off.

How do I contribute?

See CONTRIBUTING.md: mvn -B verify (JDK 25) plus pnpm check for the console, conventional commits and a DCO sign-off. Documentation and issue reports count as contributions.

Where do I ask questions?

GitHub Issues for bugs/features and good first issue tasks; security reports go through the private vulnerability reporting described in SECURITY.md. Response times are best-effort (single maintainer, see MAINTAINERS.md).