What Is Launch Darkly?

• It is a SaaS platform for developers to manage feature flags/toggles.
• It enables developers to test their own code in production.
• By using launch darkly, developers can release features to specific groups of users
• Feature Flags/Toggles can manage from the Launch Darkly dashboard easily.

First, we will talk about the features flag.

Features Flags

• Feature Flags are also known as toggles or switches
• It is a powerful tool for developers to turn code off and on in their production environment.
• Once the new code is hidden behind a feature flag, a developer can turn the specific code on for a specific set of users without impacting all users.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Launch Darkly

• Advantages

• Ability to schedule flags for progressive delivery.
• Integrated with Jira and Slack for notifications.
• Data export is available for an additional fee.

• Disadvantages

• It is available only on the SaaS platform.
• No shared context with CI/CD
• Very little integration with other tools.

LaunchDarkly Features

• Progressive Delivery: Risk-Free

• Progressive delivery is a practice that allows organizations/developers to control how and when new software features or changes are delivered.
• Progressive delivery combines software development and delivery practices allowing organizations to deliver with control.

• Beta Testing and Qualitative Feedback

• Feature flags are a great way to perform beta testing.
• It gives the facility you can perform testing of specific features with a specific set of groups and can get feedback from them.

• Kill Switches

• A kill switch is a mechanism to instantly stop a feature from production.
• If suddenly get a bunch of bug reports about a feature from the customers. Instead of having to roll back, we can simply switch the one buggy feature off.

Good to Read:- Tools to Migrate Angular Js to Angular

Implementation of Launch Darkly

You can follow below mentioned instructions to start using the Launch Darkly SDK in your Java application.

• 1st Step

Add launch darkly dependency on your dependency manager.

XML

<dependency>

  <groupId>com.launchdarkly</groupId>

  <artifactId>launchdarkly-java-server-sdk</artifactId>

  <version>6.0.0</version>

</dependency>

• 2nd Step

Now import the LaunchDarkly client in the java file.

Java

import com.launchdarkly.sdk.*;

import com.launchdarkly.sdk.server.*;

• 3rd Step

Once SDK will import and install. We will create an object of LDClient and will specify the SDK key to authorize an application to connect to a particular environment within Launch Darkly.

LDClient cl = new LDClient("SDK-key");

• 4th Step 4

LDContext cn= LDContext.builder("context-key")

  .name("Test")

  .build();

boolean flagValue = client.boolVariation("flag-key", context, false);

if (flagValue) {

  //code needs to be displayed

}

else {

//code needs to be run if flag is off

  }

Features Flags

1) What is the free version of LaunchDarkly?

Ans- LaunchDarkly offers a 14-day free trial for new users. Pricing starts at $10 user/month.

2) How do I create a project in LaunchDarkly?

Answer- Follow below steps To create a new project in launchdarkly

• Navigate to the Account settings page.
• Click On Projects tab.
• Click Create project. The “Create a project” panel appears.
• Give your project Name.
• (Optional) Give your project a unique Key. This field populates automatically based on your name, but you can change it now if you wish.

3) What are some alternatives of LaunchDarkly?

Answer- Below are the lists of alternatives of launchdarkly.

• Split
• G2 Track
• CloudBees
• Optimizely Web Experimentation

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