Jackpocket streamlines regulatory compliance and accelerates mobile app development

Jackpocket, a mobile app revolutionizing the lottery gaming experience, is committed to innovation and user-centric design. With a mission to modernize and democratize lottery participation, Jackpocket has seamlessly integrated cutting-edge technology, including the powerful feature management platform, LaunchDarkly, to enhance its user experience and platform functionality.

As a company operating in a complex regulatory environment, Jackpocket faces challenges ensuring compliance with state-specific regulations while maintaining a fast-paced software development cycle. With users spread across various states, each governed by their own set of regulations, delivering personalized feature experiences was cumbersome. Managing feature releases and targeting specific regions with precision proved to be a daunting task as teams had to create unique code for each variation and state. Even when a feature would make it into production the Jackpocket team would often have to roll back if they needed to place a fix. This rollback and fix could take anywhere from hours to days to deploy, ultimately hindering their user experience. Additionally, several teams were using various languages and tech stacks, which only added to the complexity.

Principal Engineer, Todd Resudek, looked to fix their challenges by partnering with LaunchDarkly and fully embracing a true agile software delivery lifecycle. As Jackpocket’s teams adopted LaunchDarkly, they began to ship smaller code changes to specific user groups without having to interrupt others within their workflows and teams had a wide variety of SDKs to choose from for their specific use case and application. With the Jira integration, teams gained a stable workflow and a complete view of where a flag or feature was at any point during a release.

The LaunchDarkly advanced targeting capabilities also allow Jackpocket to release features selectively based on users' geographic locations. Now, the teams can quickly release features that are compliant within certain regions and not hold back the entire software delivery lifecycle. With features like segments and multi-variations, the mobile app product teams can quickly test UI changes without requiring code changes.

Todd added: "We needed a solution that benefited our tech stack and multiple languages as well as a solution that not only had robust targeting but could help teams test their code safely across environments."

LaunchDarkly revolutionizes Jackpocket's development process by facilitating trunk-based development. With feature flags integrated into the codebase, developers can work on features independently, ensuring continuous integration without the need for long-running branches that can cause merge conflicts. This approach fosters collaboration and accelerates the delivery of new features to users.

LaunchDarkly empowers product, QA, and development teams to work autonomously, leveraging feature flags to control feature releases and conduct targeted testing. With LaunchDarkly, teams can iterate rapidly, validate hypotheses, and gather feedback without dependencies or bottlenecks, driving innovation and efficiency across the organization.

LaunchDarkly accelerates time-to-market for new features while maintaining the integrity and stability of the product. With precise feature targeting and controlled rollouts, Jackpocket can release features to their users with confidence in their quality and performance.

The integration of LaunchDarkly into Jackpocket's development workflow has yielded transformative results:

• Accelerated development cycles: LaunchDarkly's feature flagging capabilities enable Jackpocket to iterate swiftly and release features to users faster, driving continuous innovation and keeping pace with market demands. 
• Enhanced collaboration: Trunk-based development practices facilitated by LaunchDarkly promote seamless collaboration between product, QA, and development teams, enabling them to work independently without blocking one another.
• Improved time-to-market: LaunchDarkly accelerates time-to-market for new features, empowering Jackpocket to stay ahead of the competition and deliver exceptional value to users.
• Reduction in outages and improved recovery times: With the implementation of LaunchDarkly, Jackpocket can now roll back from an outage within milliseconds compared to the previous 30-minute time to restore.

LaunchDarkly has been instrumental in Jackpocket's journey to revolutionize the lottery experience. By empowering innovation, accelerating development, and enhancing user experiences, LaunchDarkly has helped position Jackpocket as a clear innovator in the mobile app lottery gaming industry. As Jackpocket continues to push the boundaries of what's possible, LaunchDarkly remains a trusted partner in driving success and delivering exceptional value to users.