Productbase

Green indicator means a feature has unfinished iterations. Roman number indicates amount of iterations in a feature.

One of the Agile principles — working software over comprehensive documentation — has potentially contributed to internal documentation being a weak point in modern software products (if it exists at all). Yet no one would argue against the need for internal documentation, especially in complex, legacy systems that serve many customers, include custom parts, and are overall large and difficult to maintain. So why do people find maintaining documentation so hard?

The main reason is double work. Kanban board tickets and internal documentation exist in two different genres. Tickets are created as user stories, tasks, bugs, and sometimes epics. Internal documentation is usually free-form tale, existing as a single piece. Development often involves changing tickets mid-flight, making it tedious and challenging to find and update all related documentation.

The problem is that once documentation is outdated, it can be even dangerous to use, let alone useless. As the saying goes, “[TOOL_NAME] is where documentation goes to die.” Without proper maintenance, it’s sometimes better to let it go entirely.

With Productbase, you can view all the features of your product in a single view. Clicking on a feature lets you see all consecutive feature iterations since its foundation, broken down by developer lanes. This approach makes it much easier for new team members — or developers less familiar with a feature — to review iterations, learn about its history, and identify the best person to ask questions. This is a much harder task with Kanban, and hardly anyone does it.

It’s also possible to send a feature iteration back to Swinlanes from Productbase by deselecting the green stage indicators on the feature iterations list. This returns the iteration to the developers who were originally assigned to it.