Unimarket is a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform.
Unimarket currently releases product enhancements and fixes periodically (at least every fortnight) and as required to maintain a robust solution. We are moving to a modern continuous delivery process, where customers can benefit from new enhancements as soon as they are ready for use (like Amazon and other SaaS solutions do under their Continuous Delivery models).
Product changes are deployed to both Demo and Production environments at the same time. All changes go through our Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) from Requirements Analysis, Design, Development, Peer Review, and Automated, Manual and Regression testing.
There are three broad categories of features:
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Enhancements
- These extend the capabilities of existing functionality and are available to all customers automatically.
- No action is required to benefit from these features.
- Unimarket does enhance optional features or modules which your community may not have enabled.
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Major New Features
- Unimarket utilizes feature-toggles to help roll out new features, such as our new Create Invoice screen or the Revamped Marketplace.
- These will be available in Demo only for a period of time before being enabled in Production. This allows customers to familiarize themselves with the changes, share feedback with Unimarket, and help prepare their own users for switching over to the new functionality.
- Customers can request to have features toggled on where applicable; or where features are intended to be part of the core solution, they may be enabled for all customers after a review period, which would be communicated in advance.
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Hotfixes
- Where an bug or unexpected behaviour is found with an existing feature, Unimarket will address these as soon as possible, usually within a hotfix release.
- The Unimarket Support team will respond to impacted customers directly (e.g. through Zendesk) to ensure prompt communications/matters being addressed.
- If a critical incident occurs, Unimarket will notify all customers.
Unimarket provides our customers with three channels of communication to keep informed of our product releases:
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Product News at Unimarket Product News
- Is focused on enhancements and major new features and is published at least once a month, to promote readership. All users have the option to click through to this page from the Learning Center within the Unimarket platform, and can subscribe to email notifications whenever a new announcement is made.
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Product Roundup
- Your Unimarket Customer Success team holds a monthly “Roundup” event for Unimarket Administrators in your region to provide an update on product releases in the prior month and what is coming.
- Please contact us if you are a Community Administrator and do not, but should, receive the invitation for these online meetings.
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Help Documentation
- Unimarket’s help documentation is updated alongside new features & enhancements, and includes great reference material and videos to help ensure you make the best use of our product!
Update Window
Releases are carried out during the planned maintenance window of 9pm to 11pm weekdays and from 9pm Saturdays to 6am Sunday New Zealand time. A “Maintenance Page” will be displayed when the main sites are not accessible. Unimarket does its utmost to ensure our maintenance window is as short as possible to minimize any disruption to customers.