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Reference resources documented in other catalogs

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Use this guide when your catalog references resources that live somewhere else — typically another team's catalog — and the linter reports them as missing:

services/order-service/index.mdx
  11:9 ✖ error Referenced event/command/query "PaymentAuthorised" does not exist [receives[0]] (refs/resource-exists)

Declare the resources as dependencies​

EventCatalog lets you list external resources in the dependencies section of eventcatalog.config.js. EventCatalog renders a placeholder page for each one, and the linter treats them as existing:

eventcatalog.config.js
export default {
  // ...
  dependencies: {
    events: [
      { id: 'PaymentAuthorised' },
      { id: 'PaymentDeclined', version: '2.0.0' },
    ],
    services: [{ id: 'payment-service' }],
  },
};
  • Without a version, the dependency satisfies any reference to that id (it behaves like latest).
  • With a version, references must match that version, using the same matching rules as local resources.
  • Dependency messages are never reported as orphans.

Any resource type can be listed: events, commands, queries, services, domains, systems, channels, flows, entities, containers, data-products, diagrams, agents, adrs, users, teams.

The linter reads eventcatalog.config.js from the directory you point it at. Both CommonJS and ES module configs are supported on current Node.js versions; if the file can't be loaded, the linter prints a warning and continues without dependencies.

Federated content​

If you use EventCatalog Federation, resources materialised under federated/<catalog>/ are scanned like local ones. Owners, services and messages from federated catalogs resolve without any extra configuration.

Ignore the generated dependencies folder​

EventCatalog writes placeholder files for dependencies into a dependencies/ folder. The linter ignores that folder by default, so you don't need to add it to ignorePatterns.