Development Plan 2026

Overview

This document outlines an incremental development plan for the MediaPulse Media Monitoring Platform throughout 2026. The plan is organized to ensure that each milestone produces a working end-to-end system, even if some features are limited or simplified.

Development Philosophy

Since the system is modular, each part can be developed independently. The plan follows these principles:

1. Start Simple: Each component begins with its minimal viable version
2. Incremental Enhancement: Features are added progressively to each component
3. Working System First: Every milestone produces a functional end-to-end system
4. Independent Development: Components can be developed in parallel when dependencies allow
5. Event-Driven Architecture: Agents run independently on their own schedules, communicating through a shared database and event queue (see System Flow for details)
6. Orchestrator-Based Execution: Hermes Orchestrator (not an agent) automatically spawns and manages agent instances, distributes jobs, and handles scaling
7. API-First Design: Agent Auth API, Agent Registry API, and Agent Data API provide standardized interfaces for agent operations
8. Version Management: All agents support versioning with only one active production version per agent type

Plan Structure

The development plan is organized into incremental milestones:

Phase 1: Minimal Viable System (Milestones 1-4)

Build the simplest working version of the entire pipeline

• Milestone 1: Foundation & Basic Pipeline - Database, Hermes Orchestrator, API services (Agent Auth, Registry, Data), agent versioning foundation, minimal agents
• Milestone 2: First Working Newsletter - End-to-end newsletter generation with hardcoded data, agents use Agent Data API, basic agent registration
• Milestone 3: Basic Data Collection - Single source data collection with agent versioning and registration
• Milestone 4: Basic Analysis & Content - Plugin system infrastructure and initial analysis plugins with versioning

Phase 2: Core Features (Milestones 5-8)

Enhance each component with core functionality

• Milestone 5: Query Strategy (Basic) - Entity discovery and query generation with full agent registration and instance management
• Milestone 6: Enhanced Data Collection - Multiple sources, deduplication, enhanced agent versioning with rollback, instance scaling
• Milestone 7: Enhanced Analysis - Additional analysis plugins and enhancements with version management for plugins
• Milestone 8: Quality Assurance (Basic) - Basic validation and compliance with agent versioning and version-aware QA

Phase 3: Advanced Features (Milestones 9-12)

Add advanced capabilities and optimizations

• Milestone 9: Enhanced Content Generation - Personalization and A/B testing with version experimentation
• Milestone 10: Advanced Data Collection - Earnings analysis plugin, SEC filings, advanced processing with advanced versioning features
• Milestone 11: Enhanced Quality Assurance - Fact-checking and advanced validation with version-aware QA enhancements
• Milestone 12: Learning Agent (Basic) - Metrics collection and basic optimization with version optimization

Phase 4: Production Ready (Milestones 13-14)

Production hardening and continuous improvement

• Milestone 13: Production Hardening - Monitoring, error handling, scalability for all API services, orchestrator, and instance management
• Milestone 14: Advanced Learning - Advanced analytics and automated optimization with advanced version management

Supporting Documents

• Success Metrics & KPIs - Technical and business metrics for measuring success
• Risk Mitigation - Technical and business risks with mitigation strategies
• Dependencies & Prerequisites - External services and team requirements
• Review Process - Milestone review process and notes

Milestone Progression

Each milestone builds upon the previous ones while maintaining a working system:

Overall Timeline

Key Principles

1. Always Working: Every milestone produces a deployable, working system
2. Incremental Value: Each milestone adds tangible value to users
3. Parallel Development: When dependencies allow, components can be developed in parallel
4. Feature Flags: Use configuration to enable/disable features as they're developed
5. Backward Compatible: New features don't break existing functionality