By Glue Team

Glue for Feature Discovery

Every product manager dreams of a complete feature inventory: "How many features do we have? What does our payment flow include? Which features did we ship in Q3?"

Reality: Most teams don't know. Features are scattered across codebases, documented in wikis that decay, or live only in engineers' heads. When a PM asks "Do we already have SSO?" the answer is "I'll ask engineering," and an interruption cascade begins.

The Feature Discovery Problem

Manual feature cataloging is broken:

• It's labor-intensive: Assembling 3-4 senior engineers to walk through the codebase for 4-6 hours to document features
• It goes stale: Within weeks, the spreadsheet is outdated. New features aren't captured. Deprecations aren't reflected
• It's incomplete: Features are discovered subjectively. What counts as a "feature"? Variations within a feature are hard to describe
• It creates bottlenecks: Every new PM, new customer, or strategic question requires the same expensive assembly

Feature discovery through code is more reliable: the codebase doesn't lie about what was built.

How Glue Discovers Features

Glue reads your codebase and auto-generates a complete feature inventory by:

1. Mapping entry points: Identifying API endpoints, UI screens, and workflows that users interact with
2. Tracing functionality: Following code paths to understand what each entry point does—validation logic, business rules, integrations
3. Cataloging variations: Identifying feature flags, A/B tests, and conditional logic that show multiple variants of the same feature
4. Connecting to data: Linking features to databases, third-party services, and dependencies
5. Quantifying scope: Estimating lines of code, number of files, and complexity per feature

Real-World Impact

Before: PM asks "Do we have bulk user import?" Engineering spends 2 hours investigating and comes back: "Sort of—there's an API endpoint, but it doesn't support CSV, only JSON, and it's limited to 1000 users per batch."

After: PM opens Glue, searches "bulk import," and instantly sees: "Bulk import endpoint exists, supports JSON, 1000-user limit, also an internal bulk job queue for unlimited batches via the API. Related files: users-service/bulk-import.ts, workers/bulk-ingest-job.ts, See code >."

Time saved: 2 hours → 2 minutes. Across a month, that compounds to 40+ hours of freed engineering time.

Using Glue for Strategic Decisions

Competitive gap analysis: "Competitors claim feature X. Do we have it?" Glue shows exact match, partial, or missing—with code references.

Customer qualification: "Is this feature available in our product?" Glue gives the answer instantly instead of "Let me check with engineering."

Roadmap prioritization: Features already partially implemented can be finished quickly. Glue surfaces these "low-hanging fruit" opportunities.

Acquisition due diligence: "What features did we acquire in this company?" Glue builds an inventory of the acquired codebase automatically.

Documentation: Use Glue's feature inventory as the source of truth. Wikis sync from code, staying current automatically.

Getting Started with Feature Discovery

Connect GitHub in 2 minutes. Glue indexes your codebase and builds a searchable feature inventory with:

• API endpoint documentation (from code)
• UI workflows and screens
• Database schema and data models
• Integrations with third-party services
• Feature flags and A/B tests
• Estimates of feature scope and complexity

No more manual spreadsheets. No more assembly meetings. Just code-truth.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does Glue discover features only from the backend, or frontend too? A: Both. Glue maps API endpoints, database schemas, and business logic (backend), as well as screens, components, and user workflows (frontend). Full-stack visibility.

Q: What if we have undocumented features that aren't obvious from code? A: Glue surfaces code-visible features automatically. Undocumented business logic is harder to discover. Use Glue as a starting point; layer on human context for nuance.

Q: How often does Glue update the feature inventory? A: Continuously as code changes. Push to main, Glue re-indexes within minutes. Feature inventory is always current.