Products¶
A product in Colleag is the container for one piece of hardware you are developing: its documents, its conversations and its own Git repository. All Product Development agents work inside a product, so this is the first thing you create.
Create a product¶
- In the sidebar, click + New next to PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT. The New Product screen opens and asks How can Colleag.ai help?
- Either describe the product in one sentence in the box at the top and click Let AI draft it →, or choose one of the three paths below it. Let AI draft it skips the interview: AI makes every decision from your sentence, and you review the drafts afterwards.
- Answer the agent's questions. It interviews you, and may search the web or read files you upload.
- When it has enough, it produces a Product Proposal. Review it — you can go back to the interview at any point and return with View Proposal.
- Accept it, and Colleag creates the product, its agents and its standards checklist, and opens the product. The first draft of each discipline's document is written in the background — a bar above the chat says how far it has got, the documents appear in the tree as they finish, and the bell tells you when all are in. It takes a while (web research, then each discipline in turn), and you can work in the product meanwhile; a document you edit or import is never overwritten by a draft. If the product's chat is still empty when the drafts are in, the orchestrator's kickoff starts there.
The three paths¶
Start a new product from scratch. An adaptive interview, web research and file import. Use this when the product does not exist yet and you want Colleag to help you think it through.
Import and manage an existing product. Upload the documentation you already have and Colleag organises it by discipline and tells you what is missing. Use this for products that are already in production.
Scope and quote a product for a customer. Feasibility, cost drivers and RFQ analysis. Use this when a customer has asked what something would take.
Fill in the company profile first
The wizard shows a green banner with your company name when the profile is complete, and an amber tip when it is not. Agents propose much better structures when they know your industry and markets.
After creation¶
The new product is selected automatically and the roundtable opens, where every enabled agent reviews what you described and issues directives. That first pass is your starting backlog.
Product families¶
Several sales articles often share one platform — the same hardware, firmware, mechanics and manuals, sold under different article numbers. Colleag models that as a family with members.
| Holds | |
|---|---|
| Family | The documentation shared by every article on the platform: hardware, firmware, mechanics, manuals, installation guide, UN 38.3, packaging spec. |
| Member | One product per sales article (ERP article number), holding only what is bound to that article: its ERP link, CE declaration of conformity or FCC filing, label artwork and sales datasheet. |
Members read the family's documents through. Nothing is copied.
You see the family in a few places:
- The Switch product selector in the document workspace groups a family with its members: the family first, then the members indented with ↳.
- The chat header shows a chip next to the product: family on the family product, member of … on a member.
- The document workspace shows a Shared documents section on a member and a Family members section on the family. See Find a document.
- Search from a member covers the family too. Hits from the family are marked with the product they come from.
- The agents know which product is the family and which are members.
Under Expected documents, the family's copy counts for a member, except the article-bound types — CE declaration of conformity, FCC filing, label artwork and sales datasheet — which the member must have itself. The member's own properties decide what is expected: the cybersecurity documents only for an EU member with a data connection. A family product is never asked for the article-bound types.
Set up during onboarding
Families and members are set up together with Colleag during onboarding for now. There is no self-service button yet.
Switch between products¶
Use the Select product… dropdown under PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT in the sidebar, or the Switch product selector at the top of the document workspace. Switching product changes the agents' context, the documents in the canvas and the draft and review counters.
Product phases¶
The coloured pill next to the product at the top of the chat is its phase. Click it to move forward.
| Phase | Meaning | Moves to |
|---|---|---|
| Draft | Being defined. Nothing is settled. | Active |
| Active | In development. This is where most work happens. | Review |
| Review | Under review before completion. | Done |
| Done | Finished. | Active, if work restarts |
The phase is a signal to your team, not a lock — it does not prevent editing.
The execution plan¶
Open ⋯ → Execution plan in the chat header. It lays the work out in numbered phases and shows which disciplines are involved in each. Later phases stay locked until the earlier ones are approved, with a message telling you exactly what is blocking, such as To unlock Phase 2, finalize and approve the Phase 1 plans.
Clicking an item opens its document in the canvas.
The product team¶
A SOP or process names a discipline (for example Hardware). The product names the person who holds that duty here. There is no row that says someone owns a SOP.
Open ⋯ → Agent settings → Team. For each active discipline you can name:
| Seat | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Responsible | The person who owns that discipline on this product. Same person as the lead under Agents. |
| Reviewer | Who should review work in that discipline. |
| Approver | Who signs off. |
Ask who is responsible for hardware on this product? in chat or in Teams. Colleag uses this table. It does not guess from job titles.
When you name someone, Colleag mails that member at the address on Settings → Members. You do not get mail for naming yourself. The informed seat is not mailed. See Notifications.
Importing documents into a product¶
Beyond the Product Maintenance path, you can import documents into an existing product at any time. Colleag reads each file, works out which discipline owns it and proposes where it belongs; you confirm before anything is written.
Delete a product¶
Click the phase pill at the top of the chat and choose Delete product…. You get a confirmation dialog first.
Deleting is permanent
Deleting removes the product, all its conversations and its Git repository. It cannot be undone. If you only want it out of the way, move it to Done instead.
Troubleshooting¶
| Problem | What to do |
|---|---|
| No agents under Product Development | Select a product in the dropdown first. |
| The proposal misunderstands your product | Go Back to the interview and correct it there. It is much cheaper than fixing documents afterwards. |
| Import put a document under the wrong discipline | Change it during the import review, or open the document and edit its properties in the canvas. |
Next: Documents and the canvas →