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KBM

Member

From: Guadalajara, Jal

Registered: 2010-05-18

Posts: 11

Documentation generation tool

I have been looking for a tool to keep track of function references, code documentation.... very much like PHP documentation site. The way you can have a function and show its parameters and return value, examples, changes over time and versions.

Does anybody know a tool to do this?

Last edited by KBM (2011-05-23 22:27:14)

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,324

Re: Documentation generation tool

Maybe this ??

And here I thought the title was proclaiming the up-and-coming youngsters planned on documenting things

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KBM

Member

From: Guadalajara, Jal

Registered: 2010-05-18

Posts: 11

Re: Documentation generation tool

Thank you very much ewaller... I had been there before but thought all they did was put some nice comments in the code to help you know what was there.... Now I see what the nice comments are for

So far I'm thinking about trying ROBODoc

You don't need to be dissapointed about the up-and-coming youngsters not planning on documenting things... I am looking for this because it is of GREAT help when the teams grow up and the project lives beyond a couple versions, so I guess we all like having things documented (or at least I like to think so). I just hope we all like (or at least spend time) documenting too ...

Again, thank you very much... I'll let you know (soon enough) what tool I found most useful

chr0nik

Member

From: Michigan, USA

Registered: 2011-03-13

Posts: 31

Re: Documentation generation tool

And here I thought the title was proclaiming the up-and-coming youngsters planned on documenting things

Haha, that cracked me up.

KBM: If you're really interested in how the PHP manual is generated, maybe start here. Assuming you need API docs generated from PHP code, check out phpDocumentor. phpdoc's online manual is generated with phpdoc and looks like this. It's slick & easy to use, the only requirement of yours I'm not sure about is "changes over time and versions" unless you're keeping a change log in your code.

KBM

Member

From: Guadalajara, Jal

Registered: 2010-05-18

Posts: 11

Re: Documentation generation tool

Oh, sorry... I forgot to mention... The code I'm trying to document varies a lot... In only one project you might find Perl and C++, and other projects might include only PHP or ruby or python... The problem is that I'm looking for a generic solution, I mean, a solution that every team can use, or at least most of them.

When I say "changes over time and versions" I mean the little hints like in phpdocs where they tell you... "As of PHP 5.x this function no longer accepts the direction parameter"...

There is indeed a changelog with that kind of information in every project, so It could be included as a Notice! or Important! section, as long as there is one to show.

Thank you chr0nik

chr0nik

Member

From: Michigan, USA

Registered: 2011-03-13

Posts: 31

Re: Documentation generation tool

Hmm... I'm not super familiar with a generic documentation tool.  I mostly use javadoc & phpdoc because they integrate well with build tools like ant & phing respectively (not that it would be difficult or impossible w/ any other documentation tool.) I'll be interested to see what you come up with.