March 2022 Summaries

The Norwegian Public Roads Administration (NPRA) has undergone significant digital transformation to improve efficiency and reduce bureaucracy, largely driven by the need for increased automation and digitization as mandated by the ABE reform. With a vast road network to manage and a sizable IT department, the NPRA adopted agile methodologies to accelerate software development, significantly increasing deployment frequency from once every few months to multiple times a day. To support this transformation, the NPRA implemented Unleash, a feature management tool that allows for the decoupling of deployment and feature releases, thereby enhancing developer velocity, reducing friction, and improving employee satisfaction. Unleash's self-hosted solution aligns with NPRA’s stringent data security measures, particularly in light of Schrems II legislation, by ensuring no Personally Identifiable Information (PII) leaves their systems. This approach has not only made the NPRA a more attractive workplace but also facilitated compliance with legal standards while leveraging cloud-based technologies. As a result, the NPRA has enhanced its agility and continues to innovate in managing its complex infrastructure needs.

Unleash, an open-source feature management tool, originated in 2014 with the aim of decoupling the release of software to production from its release to customers, addressing the team's need for flexibility and technology agnosticism. The recent $14 million Series A funding led by Spark Capital aims to bolster Unleash's position as a go-to tool for developers, emphasizing open-source advantages such as adaptability, community-driven development, and transparency. Unleash's design allows for versatile integration and segmentation capabilities, catering to both end-user and application contexts, with a strong focus on data privacy by ensuring activation strategies are evaluated locally. The funding will facilitate tripling the organization, enhancing product investment, and expanding Unleash's market reach, while maintaining a developer experience that encourages creativity, experimentation, and learning within the community.

Unleash has introduced a series of new strategy constraint operators in its Unleash Pro and Unleash Enterprise 4.9 versions, greatly simplifying the scheduling of feature releases and targeted rollouts to specific user groups. These 13 new operators streamline previously complex processes by allowing users to add constraints directly, such as scheduling a feature release at a specific time or targeting users based on email domains, without the need for custom activation strategies or extensive client SDK modifications. The operators are categorized into numeric, date and time, string, and version (SemVer) types, enhancing both flexibility and convenience. A key addition is the dynamic 'currentTime' context field, which defaults to the current time but can be overridden, facilitating time-based constraints. Users are advised to update their client SDKs, especially for Ruby, .NET, or PHP, to avoid potential incompatibility issues. The update also includes a refreshed look and additional options for fine-tuning constraints, such as case sensitivity adjustments and negating expressions, allowing for more precise control over feature exposure.

Unleash, a remote-first open-source company, expresses solidarity with Ukraine amidst the ongoing conflict with Russia, condemning the invasion as an unlawful act of violence with long-lasting impacts on Europe. The company emphasizes the importance of maintaining an open, inclusive, and respectful global community, encouraging empathy and support among its members. In response to the crisis, Unleash has pledged a $5,000 donation to the Red Cross and is offering its Enterprise SaaS free of charge to charities aiding Ukraine. The company is also committed to adhering to international sanctions and regulations, while closely monitoring the situation to support employees, particularly those near the conflict zones. Unleash remains dedicated to the principles of open-source collaboration, fostering a safe environment for idea exchange, and hopes for a swift and peaceful resolution to the conflict.

Unleash 4.8 introduces a significant update with enhanced metrics visualization for feature flags, providing users with more detailed insights into user interactions. The new release features revamped metrics tabs that now include line graphs to show feature exposure and request data over selectable time frames, such as the last 48 hours, 24 hours, or one hour, while maintaining the original pie chart visualization for quick overviews. Users can further refine their data view using environment and application controls, and raw numbers are also displayed for a comprehensive traffic overview. In addition to visual improvements, Unleash 4.8 emphasizes code quality by reducing the admin UI codebase by nearly 8,000 lines, as part of an ongoing effort to streamline the front-end architecture and remove unnecessary dependencies. This update aims to make it easier for users to understand and manage feature flag performance while ensuring the platform's underlying code remains efficient and maintainable.