Getting started in different roles

Overview

This topic includes suggested paths through the LaunchDarkly documentation specific to your role.

Get started as a software developer

As a software developer, you're responsible for creating and implementing feature flags in code. You can use feature flags in any aspect of your application, from the customer-facing user interface (UI) to the backend.

First, you must set up a LaunchDarkly SDK to integrate LaunchDarkly with your code. To learn more, read Setting up an SDK. For information about how to choose an SDK, read Client-side, server-side, and edge SDKs. After you've set up a LaunchDarkly SDK, you can create your first feature flag.

For a guided example of these steps, try the Quickstart guide or the LaunchDarkly CLI.

After you have a basic understanding of flags, you can work with others in your organization to determine how you want to target flag variations to contexts or segments. To learn more, read Target with flags.

As you add more flags, you can start organizing your flags across different environments. To learn more, read Organize your flags. This is also a good time to start thinking about managing the lifecycle of each flag. To learn more, read Flags in your codebase. You can also explore our integrations to help you make LaunchDarkly a seamless part of your workflow. Integrations let you configure the product, receive LaunchDarkly events, or use triggers to perform actions on feature flags from third-party tools. To learn more, read Integrations.

As a software developer, you may also be responsible for other engineering work related to feature management, including automatically toggling feature flags, building custom integrations, or exporting data to destinations outside of LaunchDarkly. You can perform these and other operations using the LaunchDarkly REST API. To learn more, read the tutorial Using the LaunchDarkly REST API. For complete reference materials, read the API documentation.

For more ideas on what comes next, read Additional resources.

Get started as a product manager

As a product manager or release manager, you are likely responsible for coordinating deployments and feature releases.

First, learn how to turn feature flags on and off. Then, start thinking about how you'd like to target flag variations.

As a product manager, you may also build and monitor experiments to understand the impact of features you roll out. Each experiment is a set of actions used to test a hypothesis. You can use feature flags to send flag variations to portions of your user base, and compare your end users' different reactions. You can use this for A/B/n testing, acceptance testing, and stress testing. To learn more, read Experimentation.

For more ideas on what comes next, read Additional resources.

Get started as a systems architect

As a systems architect, you're responsible for designing services and processes for your organization's engineering team.

Now that your engineering team is using LaunchDarkly, you can make LaunchDarkly a seamless part of your workflow. Integrations let you configure the product, receive LaunchDarkly events, or use triggers to perform actions on feature flags from third-party tools. For example, LaunchDarkly integrates with various application performance management (APM) tools, with collaboration tools like Slack, with IDE connectors, with workflow management tools, and with several other productivity and management applications. To learn more, read Integrations.

To learn about common problems integrations can help solve, read Integrations use cases. For best practices to help you succeed with LaunchDarkly on specific platforms, read our platform-specific guides.

For more ideas on what comes next, read Additional resources.

Get started as an account administrator

As an account administrator, you are likely responsible for managing account members, monitoring billing and usage, and facilitating any integrations.

First, learn about how to set up and manage account members. Each member can have one of several built-in roles within LaunchDarkly, including Reader, Writer, or Admin. To learn more, read Built-in roles. If you would like to set up more precise access control, you can configure custom roles for your members. To learn more, read Custom roles.

Next, make sure you understand the options for securing your account, including how to precisely manage which account members can perform certain actions and how to enable multi-factor authentication and single sign-on in your LaunchDarkly account. To learn more, read Secure your account.

If you are in a larger organization, you may also think about grouping your account members into teams. Teams allow you to control permissions for groups of account members, rather than for individuals. Additionally, teams allow you to map permissions in LaunchDarkly to your organizational structure. For example, you can give mobile flag permissions to the mobile team and desktop flag permissions to the desktop team.

Once your account is set up and your organization has started using feature flags, you can use LaunchDarkly's data visualization tools to understand your monthly billing metrics.

For more ideas on what comes next, read Additional resources.