Crash Course for Product Stage Resources

Objectives for this page

This page is intended to provide a crash course style overview of the most important Product Analytics related resources for each product Stage. As a Product Analyst or other curious GitLab team member, it can be helpful to have a quick and easy reference for each product Stage to quickly understand high-level functionality, key objectives or a distilled product roadmap, and key data resources currently used under a specific Stage or Group within GitLab before jumping in to an analysis.

If this page serves it’s purpose, Product Analysts should be able to visit this handbook page before working with a Stage or Group to obtain helpful contextual information without needing to do a scavenger hunt search across dozens of handbook pages to find relevant information.

Helpful places to start

Learn about analytics relevant product stage topics grouped by Section

Why are these groupings called ‘Stages’? At GitLab, we build a product that supports every stage of the DevOps Lifecycle.

Dev Section

Manage Stage

This Stage helps teams manage their software delivery lifecycle with metrics and value stream insight in order to streamline and increase their delivery velocity. Insights, authentication, audits, compliance, user management, group & sub-group management, and project management.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Helpful video resources

Plan:Optimize YouTube Channel

Team meetings, AMAs, etc. for the Plan:Optimize Group

Manage:Access YouTube Channel

Team meetings, AMAs, etc. for the Manage:Access Group

Manage:Organization YouTube Channel

Team meetings, AMAs, etc. for the Manage:Organization Group

Product direction

Problems to Solve from Product Direction Page

The Problems to Solve section of Manage’s Product Direction Page is the most condensed documentation to understand Manage’s big picture focus quickly.

Performance indicators

Metrics from Product Direction Page

This link breaks down the performance indicators for each Manage Group clearly and links out to the Internal Handbook PI page.

Key handbook pages

Manage Direction Page

Main Manage Stage Page

Slack channels

#s_manage

Team members

Handbook page to find Manage team members to collaborate with

Plan Stage

Enable teams to effectively plan and execute work in a single application. This stage enables portfolio planning and management through epics, groups (programs), milestones, etc. to organize and track progress

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Helpful video resources

Plan Stage YouTube playlist

What the Plan Stage team is working on

Link to 1 Year Plan

A great handbook page to skim to understand the roadmap and focus for Plan

Performance indicators

Link to performance indicators

Resource to understand the Performance Indicators for the Dev Section - Page can be searched by Stage and Group

Key handbook pages

Main Plan page

Plan direction page

Slack channels

#s_plan

Team members

Handbook page to find Plan team members to collaborate with

Create Stage

Create provides tools that support the beginning of the DevOps Life Cycle. Source Code management, Code Review, Wiki, Web IDE, etc.

Start on the GitLab website page dedicated to Create to get an understanding of features included in this Stage.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Helpful video resources

Must be logged into GitLab Unfiltered account

Create Stage YouTube playlist

Create Stage UX YouTube playlist

Product roadmap link

Link to product direction / vision

Resource to understand the goals for this team

Performance indicators

Link to performance indicators

Resource to understand the Performance Indicators for the Dev Section - Page can be searched by Stage and Group

Key handbook pages

Primary Create Stage handbook page

Contains helpful information about how Create operates and current team members

Slack channels

#s_create

#s_create_pm

Team members

Handbook page to find Create team members to collaborate with

CI Section

Verify Stage

Verify provides teams with tools that help facilitate continuous integration. This includes but is not limited to pipelines and runners.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Important data documentation

There are a few models that are exclusive to the Verify stage that you can reference as a SSOT:

  • wk_gitlab_dotcom_monthly_ci_compute_minutes is a model you can use to identify the number of runners, pipelines, and CI Build Minutes used on a per project, per namespace level. Helpful video resources

Tanuki Tech: Verify and Secure

This video showcases the product functionality of Verify and Secure and how to talk about those functionalities from a sales perspective.

Verify Team Overview

Product roadmap link

Section Direction: Verify Stage Resource to understand the long-term goals for the Verify team

Performance indicators

Ops Section PI An internal handbook page that lists all performance indicators under the Operations section

Key handbook pages

Verify Stage Product Page

A central hub for all pages related to the Verify stage

Slack channels

#s_verify Overall channel for Verify

#g_pipeline-execution Slack channel for the Verify:Pipeline Execution product category.

#g_pipeline-authoring Slack channel for the Verify:Pipeline Authoring product category.

#g_runner Slack channel for the Verify:Runner product category.

#g_pipeline-security Slack channel for the Verify:Pipeline Security product category.

Team members

Handbook page to find Verify team members to collaborate with

Package Stage

The Package team works on the package and container registries, as well as the Dependency Proxy.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Primarily time series analyses for Package features on GitLab.com

Important data documentation

  • wk_gitlab_dotcom_package_events is a model you can use for all Snowplow events related to Package. This includes but is not limited to, package actions for all available Package types on GitLab.com

Helpful video resources

User Interviews YouTube Channel

General and feature specific user interviews for the Package team

Demos and Speedruns

Package Handbook section with feature and roadmap demos

Product roadmap link

Link to product roadmap

Resource to understand the long-term goals for this team

OKRs

Link to OKRs handbook page

Resource to understand the current OKRs for this team

Key documentation

Main Package Team Handbook Page

It can be helpful to search for specific topics on the Package team’s main page

GitLab Docs Package Page

GitLab Docs are awesome!

Slack channels

#s_package

Team members

Handbook page to find Package team members to collaborate with

List of Package team members and their stable counterparts to contact if needed

CD Section

Deploy Stage

The Deploy team covers the deployment and release functionality of GitLab

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Product roadmap link

Product Direction - Delivery Resource to understand the long-term goals for this team

Performance indicators

Link to performance indicators

Resource to understand the Performance Indicators for the Ops Section - Page can be searched by Stage and Group

Key handbook pages

Deploy Primary Handbook Page

Slack channels

#cd-section

#g_environments

#s_deploy

Team members

Handbook page to find Create team members to collaborate with

Sec Section

Secure Stage

Static Application Security Testing (SAST), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST), Container Scanning, and Dependency Scanning

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Some seemingly duplicate charts in Dynamic Analysis Metrics are used by the team to compare totals from different data sets.

Helpful video resources

DevSecOps Overview A great place to start for a high-level overview relating to Secure functionality.

Product direction link

Secure product direction page - 1 year plan

Performance indicators

Performance indicators linked in Secure handbook page

Key handbook pages

Secure stage primary handbook page

Slack channels

#s_secure

Team members

Product categories page section to find Secure team members to collaborate with

Secure Handbook page section to find Secure engineering team members to collaborate with

Govern Stage

Manage security vulnerabilities, policies, and compliance across your organization.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Helpful video resources

Govern Stage YouTube Channel

Govern UX YouTube Channel

Product direction link

Govern product direction page - 1 Year Plan

Performance indicators

Internal handbook performance indicators for the Secure section

Key handbook pages

Govern stage primary handbook page

Slack channels

#s_govern

Team members

Handbook page to find Govern team members to collaborate with

Govern Handbook page section to find Govern engineering team members to collaborate with

Core Platforms Section

Systems Stage (Distribution, Gitaly, Geo Groups)

Supports enterprise-grade operational experience of GitLab products from streamlined deployment and maintenance, disaster recovery, secure search and discoverability, to high availability, scalability, and performance. The Systems Stage includes Distribution, Gitaly and Geo Groups.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Important data documentation

There are no Enablement metrics currently collected in our Postgres Replica data for GitLab.com

The following tables can be used for Service Ping metric reporting.

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_all_time - Use for all time timeframe metrics

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_7_day - Use for 7 day timeframe metrics

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_28_day - Use for 28 day timeframe metrics

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_monthly - Use for all, 7, 28 timeframe metrics pre filtered to the last ping of the month (does not include none or null timeframe metrics)

  • workpace_product.wk_fct_ping_instance_metric_none - Use for metrics with a none timeframe

  • workpace_product.wk_fct_ping_instance_metric_null - Use for metrics with a null timeframe

Use the metrics dictionary to determine the timeframe value for any service ping metric.

Helpful video resources

Enablement::Systems is a relatively new Stage. PDI will add helpful video overviews as they become available.

Product roadmap link

Enablement Product Direction Includes Stage and Group level details

Performance indicators

Enablement Section PI handbook page

Key handbook pages

Overall Enablement Section Handbook page for Engineering

Slack channels

#s_enablement

#g_distribution

#g_geo

Team members

Handbook page to find Systems team members to collaborate with

OR

All team members section of engineering page

Data Stores Stage (Memory, Global Search, Database, Pods Groups)

Supports enterprise-grade operational experience of GitLab products from streamlined deployment and maintenance, disaster recovery, secure search and discoverability, to high availability, scalability, and performance. The Data Stores Stage includes Memory, Global Search, Database and Pods Groups.

Click to expand

Top dashboards referenced by this team

Important data documentation

There are no Enablement metrics currently collected in our Postgres Replica data for GitLab.com

The following tables can be used for Service Ping metric reporting.

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_all_time - Use for all time timeframe metrics

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_7_day - Use for 7 day timeframe metrics

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_28_day - Use for 28 day timeframe metrics

  • common_mart.mart_ping_instance_metric_monthly - Use for all time and 28 day timeframe metrics, pre filtered to the last ping of the month (does not include 7 day, none, or null timeframe metrics)

  • workpace_product.wk_fct_ping_instance_metric_none - Use for metrics with a none timeframe

  • workpace_product.wk_fct_ping_instance_metric_null - Use for metrics with a null timeframe

Use the metrics dictionary to determine the timeframe value for any service ping metric.

Helpful video resources

Enablement::Data Stores is a relatively new Stage. PDI will add helpful video overviews as they become available.

Product roadmap link

Enablement Product Direction Includes Stage and Group level details

Performance indicators

Enablement Section PI handbook page

Key handbook pages

Overall Enablement Section Handbook page for Engineering

Slack channels

#s_enablement

#g_memory

#g_global_search

#g_database

Team members

Handbook page to find Data Stores team members to collaborate with

OR

All team members section of engineering page

Growth Section

Although the Growth Section falls within the Maketing & Strategy division, the Growth Section has dedicated support from Product Data Insights on topics within our ownership areas.

Growth Stage (Acquisition, Activation Groups)

Growth owns the free and trial registration and new user onboarding experiences.

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Top dashboards referenced by this team

Important data documentation

  • workspace_product.wk_rpt_namespace_onboarding This model contains all of the most commonly analyzed Growth use cases including namespace and namespace creator attributes and SaaS product behavior. This model can be contributed to by PDI, DEX and Marketing Analytics teams.

  • Because Growth topics are broad and cross-functional, there are many data models that are commonly used to answer Growth product analytics questions. More comprehensive documentation can be found in Product Data Insights Data Models Cheat Sheet.

Helpful video resources

Growth YouTube playlist

Product roadmap link

Growth Direction handbook page

Performance indicators

Key handbook pages

Overall Growth Section Handbook page for Engineering

Growth Direction Page

Slack channels

#s_growth

Team members

All team members section of engineering page

Last modified February 21, 2024: Update file crash-course.md (459ebc63)