Fifty emails, one app

A college has a timetable app. In one week the team gets 50 messages. Students want dark mode. A teacher found a login bug. The principal wants the college logo changed.

The team cannot do everything today. What do they do first? Who do they tell?

Key words

Word	What it means	Example
Change request	A written ask for a change to the software.	Add dark mode
Priority	How urgent or important a change is.	1 is the most urgent
Impact	What a change will affect.	The login page and the database
Schedule	A plan of what is done and when.	Login bug on Monday and Tuesday
Stakeholder	A person who cares about the product or is affected by it.	Students, teachers, the principal
Technical audience	People who know how the software is built.	Other developers
Non-technical audience	People who use the software but do not know how it is built.	The principal
Documentation	Written records of what was asked, decided and done.	A change log
Regression test	Run the old tests again after a change, to check that nothing else broke.
Control and release	Check and approve the change, then give it to the users.

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Identify and document

Changes come from feedback and reviews: messages, surveys, bug reports, meetings.

Write each one down in a change request. A good request says: what is wrong or wanted, who asked, how urgent it is, and what it might affect. Without a record, work is lost. People also argue about what was agreed.

A change request

Field	Example
Number	CR-014
What	Students cannot log in when the password has a space
Asked by	A teacher, by email, on Monday
Priority	1 (most urgent): students cannot use the app
Impact	Login page and password check
Status	Planned: fix on Tuesday

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Write down more than the request

data-callouts.note.label

Also write what the team decided, who agreed and the date. A change log is a list of every change, with its date. Later, nobody has to guess what happened.