Operational Feature Flags Best Practices

Operational feature flags are used to manage and control the behavior of a system, often referred to as kill switches or circuit breakers. They can be short-term or long-term flags, with common use cases including operational interaction testing, API rate limiting, modifying logging levels, release management, and load shedding. Best practices for using operational feature flags include documenting the flag, indicating whether it is permanent or temporary, controlling who can change a flag, and using a relay proxy to reduce stress on infrastructure.