Before you start
- You need an email address and a payment card.
- You don’t need a GitHub account or a developer. Iron Octopus keeps your code in a repository it manages for you, and the code is yours.
Steps
1
Sign up
Go to app.ironoctopus.ai/start and work through Account, Plan and Payment. Payment is handled securely by Stripe.
2
Describe your first idea
In the First idea step, tell Iron Octopus what to build, in plain words. A new feature, a change, or a fix all work. Iron Octopus creates your first project and starts planning.
3
Review and approve the plan
Iron Octopus asks any questions it needs answered, then shows one plan to review: what it will build, what’s left out, the requirements that define done, as acceptance criteria, and the work items it will build. Questions you skip become recorded assumptions.Click Approve plan and create to create the feature. Nothing is built yet.
4
Start building
On your Home page, the feature appears under Needs you as Ready to build. Click Start building. This records your approval of the plan.
5
Follow the work
Iron Octopus builds the work items and reviews each one. You can watch progress under In progress on Home, and see anything it sent back under Caught in review. When every work item is done, the feature moves to Acceptance on its own, and Iron Octopus verifies every requirement.
6
Release it
When every required acceptance criterion is met, the feature shows under Needs you as Ready to release. Click Release feature. Iron Octopus merges it into your project’s main branch, with a full record of what was asked for, built and checked.
Releasing doesn’t deploy your app. It adds the finished feature to your project’s code.
Next steps
How Iron Octopus works
The full path a feature takes, and the rules behind each step.
Building blocks
How workspaces, projects, features and work items fit together.