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Beta tester handbook
What being a tester means, what to do in the first day, the week after, and at the end; the three surveys and the quick note; how to file an issue or an idea that can actually be acted on; and the rules about what never to send.
You are one of a handful of people playing Latch before it is finished. This page is the whole deal — what is asked of you, what you get, and how to hand feedback over so it lands.
The honest version, again
On the hosted beta instance, the person running it can see everything you put on it — reflections, check-ins, photos, voice memos. Nothing there is backed up. Every profile and everything in it is destroyed when the trial ends; the length is not set yet and will become clear as feedback comes in, and you will get warning before the wipe so you can export. Treat it as a playground, not a diary. Survey answers are different: they are kept, because they are what the trial is for.
What "serious" means
- Play it for real, for a stretch. Lock, do the reflection, spin, take the training, let the clock run. A screenshot tour finds nothing; a week of use finds everything.
- Jump through the hoops. Sometimes you will be asked to try one specific thing — a layout, a rule, a flow. Do it that day and say what happened.
- Write it down while it is fresh. Confusion has a half-life of about an hour. The quick note on the Feedback page exists for exactly that moment.
- Be blunt and be specific. "The wheel felt cheap" is a feeling; "the wheel took an hour off a two-hour lock on my first spin and I nearly quit" is data. Both are welcome; the second one changes the game.
The rhythm
| When | Do |
|---|---|
| Day 0 | Read The spirit. Sign up, set your timezone, do your first lock. |
| Day 1–2 | Feedback → First impressions. Catch what it felt like walking in; that view is gone in a week. |
| Every day | Play. Drop a quick note the moment something confuses, breaks, or delights you. |
| Day 7-ish | Feedback → A week in. What you actually do, not what you thought you would. |
| Any time | Something broke? File it. Have an idea? Same. |
| When the trial is called | Feedback → Exit. The blunt one. Then export anything you want to keep. |
The dashboard nudges you when a survey is ready. Each takes about five minutes. Skip any question that does not apply — nothing is filled in for you.
Filing an issue that can be acted on
Bugs go on the forge, Issues → New issue → Bug report, or in the room if you would rather not make an account. A report is actionable when someone who is not you can reproduce it. That takes five things, and the template asks for all of them:
- Version — the footer of any page, or
/healthz. - Where — hosted beta or your own install; phone or desktop; which browser.
- What you did — the exact steps, in order. "Locked 4 h, spun, tapped Undo" beats "undo is broken".
- What you expected, and what happened — copy the sentence on screen word for word. Most refusals are deliberate and the sentence is the diagnosis; if this one was wrong, the words are the evidence.
- A screenshot, after you have looked at what is in it.
One bug per issue. If you are not sure it is a bug, file it anyway and say so — "not sure this is wrong" is a fine first line.
Never attach an export
latch.json, the CSVs and the bundle are your whole journal in plaintext. No bug needs
them; if a row is needed, you will be asked for that one row. Same for your API token
and anything from .env.
Pitching an idea
Issues → New issue → Suggestion. The best suggestions describe the situation, not the feature — "I finish tasks on the train and log them later" is what produced the when field; "add a date picker" would not have. The template asks:
- What were you trying to do? The moment you wished for it.
- How often does that come up? Daily, weekly, once.
- What do you do instead today? The workaround is often half the design.
- What would you like to happen? Your best version. Rough is fine.
- How does it fit the rules? Nothing leaves the box; the log stays honest; prose is private. If it bends one, say so — sometimes that is the interesting part.
- How much does it matter to you? One to five. A 2 is a legitimate answer.
Ideas that will get argued rather than built straight away: anything that sends data off the box, anything that hides or softens the emergency key, anything that makes the log lie. Argue anyway — the spirit page says why those lines exist, and it is not above being wrong.
Where things go
| Bugs | the forge → Bug report, or the room |
| Ideas | the forge → Suggestion, or the room |
| How it feels, what you do, what you'd change | Feedback in the app — the surveys and the quick note |
| Anything private | @lockedtrainee:matrix.aurionblack.com directly |
The forge is https://forge.aurionblack.com/lockedtrainee/latch (accounts are activated by
hand, so there is a short wait). The room is #latch:matrix.aurionblack.com. Please do not
DM bugs — the next pup cannot learn from a DM.
What you get
A game shaped by what you said, your name (or not) in the thanks, and first look at what comes next. A supporter badge for testers is on the roadmap and will be retroactive.
This page is docs/beta.md in the repo. Spotted a mistake? Tell us how to report it →