DX Launch Week Recap

That’s a wrap on Bucket’s first-ever launch week.

Kicking off the week we asked a seemingly simple question: What does life look like when you create a new feature?

We’ve asked that question to hundreds of developers. And the answer is always more complex and convoluted than they’d like. The current set of feature flagging tools, sort of, kinda works for B2B SaaS, but it’s a friction-full experience.

With Bucket, we’re tackling that friction wherever we find it. Over the course of the week we released something new each day to improve the workflow of shipping features faster.

• Monday: CLI with Type Safety
• Tuesday: Toolbar
• Wednesday: Event log
• Thursday: Flag deprecator
• Friday: Revamped docs

These come together to create a workflow that supports you in shipping features and getting feedback where needed.

It’s purpose-built for the SaaS use-case. That means you can skip the awkward workarounds you need when using old school feature flagging tools that were designed around users, not companies, and for B2C or ecommerce.

Workflow: from idea to adoption

With these new additions, shipping features with Bucket now works like this:

Step 1: Flag your feature with type-safety

Use the Bucket CLI to create and sync features, flagging features as you build them:

Step 2: Test internally with Toolbar

Use the Toolbar built into our SDK to manually toggle your own - or team members - features on or off within your application.

Step 3: Release to Beta users

When you’re ready to test your feature with beta testers, select them in the Access tab in the Bucket UI. Set the release stage to “Beta” to communicate progress internally and use the Event log to see if everything is set up correctly.

Step 4: Get feedback

Ask your beta testers for feature feedback so you can address any issues fast. Use requestFeedback or automated surveys to easily get user feedback into Slack.

import { useFeature } from "@bucketco/react-sdk";

function StartHuddleButton() {
  const { requestFeedback } = useFeature("huddle");

  return (
    <>
      <button
        onClick={() => requestFeedback({ title: "How do you like Huddles?" })}
      >
        Give feedback!
      </button>
    </>
  );
}

Step 5: Track adoption

Track feature awareness and adoption by simply using track or our Segment integration.

Choose an adoption strategy to differentiate between companies that have just tried versus truly adopted the feature.
Use these metrics to know who to ask for feature feedback, then iterate based on the feedback and the adoption you’re seeing.

import { useFeature } from "@bucketco/react-sdk";

function StartHuddleButton() {
  const { track, requestFeedback } = useFeature("huddle");

  return (
    <>
      <button onClick={track}>Start huddle!</button>
      <button
        onClick={() => requestFeedback({ title: "How do you like Huddles?" })}
      >
        Give feedback!
      </button>
    </>
  );
}

Step 6: Set entitlements and release to GA

If you’re working on a paid feature, set the feature access to match your subscription plans. Then update the stage to “General availability” and hit release.

Try Bucket for yourself

These improvements have been months in the works but all came together last week. Compared to your current feature flagging workflow, we think you’ll find the Bucket way helps you to ship the right features faster.

Get started, and let us know if we're right.