Release Notes: What Are They?

Context

PAR Ordering provides a Release Notes publication every time a major change (or set of changes) happens to any part of the Ecosystem. This article aims to briefly explain a few things about Release Notes and how important it is to keep yourself up to date when the latest version goes live.

What are the Release Notes?

Not long ago, people used to buy products and software at face value. There was no tangible feedback loop between developers and users. Now, of course, the dynamics of product delivery have altered drastically, from old-school software CDs delivered once a year to buying software on a weekly basis!

With such frequent product distribution, the need for a communication channel between the user and product becomes important, to convey upcoming features, changes, improvements, and enhanced user experience. This communication channel is called “Release Notes”.

In other words, Release Notes explain new features added, issues resolved, and improvements in a productor software by the company.

When does it happen?

PAR Ordering releases happen every two weeks. The way we notify about them is by publishing an article where you can find content exclusively applicable to you.

All the Release Notes KBs can be found here.

Why is my app not updated after the latest release version goes live?

When a new release version is live, you may notice that your app is not automatically updated. This can be solved turning on the Automatic updates.

Let´s check how Automatic Updates work for iOS and Android:

iOS:

On the iOS side, only users that have Automatic updates turned-on in their Settings will get the latest app version installed automatically.

With App Updates turned on, the updates occur behind the scenes automatically.

If users do not have this option turned on in their apps, they have the option to do it manually.

How to update apps manually on your iPhone:

1. Open the App Store.
2. Tap your profile icon at the top of the screen.
3. Scroll to see pending updates and release notes. Tap Update next to an app to only update that app or tap Update All.
4. We cannot update apps for users until they do it themselves.

Android:

On the Android side, app updates from the Google Play Store can be done either automatically or manually.

How to update apps automatically on Android?

1. Open the Google Play Store app
2. On the search bar, depending on the Android OS, there are either three horizontal lines in the upper-left corner, or the user google account circle on the upper-right corner. Click on the provided option, then click Settings.
3. On the network preferences section, there is an option to enable auto-update for the apps, select that option and from there, the user should get automatic updates.

How to update the apps manually on Android?

1. Open the Google Play Store app
2. On the search bar, depending on the Android OS, there are either three horizontal lines in the upper-left corner, or the user google account circle on the upper-right corner. Click on the provided option, then click Manage apps & device or My apps on older Android OS.
3. The user can either update all apps with the Update All option or can select which individual app they want to update.

Please note that the users of the app are the ones who need to update the version of the app.

If you are still having issues updating the app, you can always submit a request to our Ninja agents for assistance.

Forced Mobile App Update

There is a Forced Mobile App Update feature available in Management Center. It is used to force all mobile apps (iOS and Android) to update to the latest specified version. Until the update is completed, the mobile apps will not be usable. With this feature, we make the apps unusable until users update their apps.

More info here: Forced Mobile App Update