Lecture on Feature Requests and Bug Reports in Software Development

Introduction

• Speaker: San, co-author of best-selling system design interview books
• Focus: Understanding the journey of feature requests and bug reports
• Aim: Simplify complex system design concepts

Process Overview

1. User Feedback Gathering

   • Product team collects user feedback and requirements.

2. Breaking Down Work

   • Product and engineering teams break work into user stories.
   • Developers pick up items during sprint planning.
   • Typical sprint duration: 1-2 weeks
   • Larger projects can span multiple sprints.

3. Prioritization and Planning

   • Engineering managers/tech leads prioritize tasks.
   • Balance team capacity across sprints.

Development Phase

• Building

  • Developers start building after sprint planning.
  • Use of RFC or design document for high-level architecture.

• Source Control

  • Use of Git or similar for source control.
  • Creation of feature branches to isolate work.
  • Database schema changes managed via migration scripts.

• Code Review and Testing

  • Pull requests for team review.
  • Merged into main branch post comprehensive unit testing.

Continuous Integration and Deployment (CI/CD)

• Pipeline Activation

  • Merging triggers CI/CD pipeline using tools like GitHub Actions and Jenkins.

• Environment Validation

  • Features tested across dev, test, and staging environments.
  • Staging mirrors production for consistency.

Quality Assurance (QA)

• Validation Process
  • QA engineers conduct thorough testing: functionality, regression, security, performance.
  • Some teams use developers for validation.

User Acceptance Testing (UAT) and Release

• UAT Process

  • Product team, QA, and developers collaborate on validation.
  • Techniques such as canary releases and feature flags used for risk reduction.

• Production Rollout

  • Use of maintenance windows, read replicas, rollback scripts.
  • Techniques: Multi-phase migrations, feature flags for access control.

Monitoring and Metrics

• Site Reliability Engineers (SREs)

  • Monitor metrics, logs, and traffic for issues.
  • Bugs prioritized and fixed.

• Analytics Monitoring

  • Ensure features do not negatively impact key business metrics.

Conclusion

• Summary: Feature requests journey through design, development, testing, incremental rollout.
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