Guidance Lifecycle
This site uses a four-stage lifecycle system to indicate content maturity and help you identify the most appropriate guidance for your team's needs:
🔺 ALPHA - Early draft under development. Incomplete content may contain placeholders or open questions. Intended for work group members, reviewers, and early contributors who can provide feedback on emerging concepts.
🟧 BETA - Core guidance is present and usable. Content is stable enough for practical application, but feedback is encouraged as refinements may still occur. Suitable for early adopters and pilot programs.
🔷 RC - Release Candidate content is functionally complete and undergoing final validation. Few changes expected. Appropriate for broader stakeholders preparing for full adoption across their programs.
🟢 GA - General Availability content is fully reviewed and approved. This represents stable, recommended guidance for broad use across all DoD teams and mission partner environments.
Each page displays its current lifecycle stage and last updated timestamp. Content may advance through stages based on validation, feedback, and operational experience—some guidance may skip stages when appropriate for mission needs.
This approach means you can quickly assess whether content aligns with your team's risk tolerance and implementation timeline while supporting the DoD's need for both innovation and mission assurance.