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Shipbell documentation
Shipbell collects problem reports and ideas from inside your apps, shows your progress on a public board, and lets everyone who asked know the moment their request ships.
How Shipbell works
You add Shipbell to your app. Your users report problems and suggest ideas without leaving it, your team answers in the Shipbell admin, and each product gets a public board.
- Reports. "Something doesn't work" sends a note, an optional screenshot and the technical details your team needs. Depending on the project, the reporter chooses whether a report is public or private, or every report stays private. Technical details are never shown publicly.
- Ideas. Ideas are public. People vote on them, and each idea has a status.
- Roadmap items. Your team writes fix cards, made from one or more reports, and team items of its own.
- The progress board. It shows all of them in four columns: Under review, Planned, In progress and Done.
- Closing the loop. When a card moves to Done, everyone who voted, followed or reported it hears about it exactly once.
Workspaces and projects
Everything in Shipbell belongs to a project, and every project belongs to a workspace. A workspace is your developer account. A project is one product: it has its own keys, signing keys, branding, statuses, settings and board.
Shipbell runs on one domain:
| Address | What it serves |
|---|---|
app.shipbell.app | The admin, where your team works |
api.shipbell.app | The REST API |
widget.shipbell.app | The web widget files |
<slug>.shipbell.app | Your project's public board |
docs.shipbell.app | This documentation |
Your app vouches for its users
People never create a Shipbell account. Your backend signs a short-lived token for the user who is signed in to your app, and Shipbell checks it with your public key. Shipbell keeps only public keys, so nothing it holds can sign in as your users.
Anyone can read a public board. Voting, posting, commenting and following need your app's sign-in. Sign your users in explains the token.
Ways in
- Web widget: a problem form for your site, and links that open your board.
- iOS (ShipbellKit): a Swift package with a native problem sheet.
- REST API: for everything else, such as Android apps and your own servers. The API reference lists every endpoint.
Where to start
Follow the Quick start to connect your first app.