Looking Back

These days it’s easier than ever to lose track of time. Is it 2:00 or 3:00? Is it Monday or Tuesday? November or December? When you’re largely working from home, it’s especially hard to tell what you’ve accomplished over the course of a year. Fortunately, we programmers use version control software that keeps track of every single change that’s made to a code base. Stepping through the changes committed to Ready Room since January 1st, it’s striking to see just how much a small team can accomplish.

February

At the beginning of the year we set to work on storyboards and released this feature on February 6th. With storyboard support, Ready Room upped it’s inspection readiness game. Now our users could create rich-text storyboards either from scratch or derived from over 100 templates. Moreover, they could easily find and filter storyboards, upload supporting documents, and use the flashcard feature to rehearse.

Just two weeks later, we deployed the first of several releases designed to improve the user experience. With that late-February release Ready Room users could move open tasks left and right without having to close and drag them. They could also copy storyboards and get notified when a task is sent back.

April / May

In mid-April we added Fast Actions and support for Restricted SMEs, which allows you to give team members a view of the system limited to their unfulfilled tasks. And in May we changed scribe notes from a chat-like user interface to a document-style rich-text interface with auto-save and real time updates. Later that month we added file preview.

July / August

In midsummer, Synclinical relocated from the Massachusetts to California! Nevertheless, in August we released support for persistent inspection filters, auto-saving storyboards, and the ability to see who else is viewing the task that is currently open. Later that month we focused on delivering documentation to inspectors with the addition of cover sheets and the ability to create zip archives of individual requests. In addition, we added the ability to sort the inspector view.

September

In September we made it configurable as to whether an inspector can download files. As well as support for user time zones and persistent storyboard filters.

November

The first week of November saw a revamped website and the release of “Briefings.” Briefings enable team members to schedule secure video conferences with each other and with inspectors. Briefings also supports external users via public briefing links. No additional software is needed for participants to access a briefing, share screens, chat, and access other expected conferencing features.

Just a few weeks later Box integration was released. With Box support, Ready Room users can upload files, cover sheets, and zip archives directly to one or more inspector’s shared Box folders. Including support for subfolders and file versioning.

December

And while you don’t know it, in December and periodically throughout the year we released product updates focused on keeping automated tests, system libraries, application platforms, and operating systems up to date—it’s a security thing.

2022

We have a lot of exciting functionality planned for 2022, so watch this space.

The Synclincal team wishes you and yours a happy, healthy, and prosperous new year.