Product Management Process

Starting from iMetal version 4.5, Jonas Metals Software will introduce new approaches in product and release management within the organisation.

While increasing the size of the product development team, JMS has brought in agile development and release management practices. The objectives are to:

• Be able to respond to the customer and market requirements faster
• Be flexible and adaptable to the change requests, 
• Manage the development and release processes in a predictable and transparent manner
• Align the whole organisation and its activities to support the release plans and schedules. 

One of the main changes in the processes is the selection of new features and enhancements for the next release. The product management team will determine the scope for the next release by working with our customers, both internal and external. The selection process takes an economic view of the requirements such as the benefit of the feature to the customers, its value to the overall product and its scale of investment, and the market view. Strict change management processes will be in place for the release scope change requests. 

Another change is in the number of releases per year. JMS/Metalogic will release two major versions in six months, one in April and the other one in October, which are called General Availability releases (GA Release). Major releases, or GA releases, will contain new features, enhancements and improvements. Besides major releases, there will be release updates for the supported iMetal versions each month. Release updates will only contain the fixes for the issues reported by the customers and internally, and improvements, however no new features or enhancements will be included in the release updates.

One month before each GA release in April and October, a Beta Testing Programme will start. In the Beta Testing Programme (BTP), the participating customers will be able to see and experience the new features and enhancements. The objective is that the customers participating in the BTP should upgrade to the new version shortly after the GA release is published. 

JMS/Metalogic will start the recruitment process for the upcoming BTP for each release by contacting customers and informing them about the BTP. The product management team will formally invite the customers who are willing to participate in the BTP programme.

Each release will come with a release note document, in which all the changes made in the software since the last version are reported. Therefore, it is recommended to review the release notes before planning to upgrade to a major version or apply the release update.

The release document will also contain the section “What’s New” where all the new features and enhancements are briefly described. Where possible, short introductory recordings for the new features and enhancements will also be shared as part of the installation.

In order to plan, schedule and manage the product development and release cycles, and manage the issues reported by our customers, JMS/Metalogic has invested in and implemented the best products in the market.   

JMS/Metalogic has a continuous learning culture and pursues relentless improvement in the product development, release and support areas.