Software documentation: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 05:13, 2 February 2024

Revision as of 02:03, 6 February 2024

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In the case of a [[Library (computing)|software library]], the code documents and user documents could in some cases be effectively equivalent and worth conjoining, but for a general application this is not often true.

Typically, the user documentation describes each feature of the program, and assists the user in realizing these features. It is very important for user documents to not be confusing, and for them to be up to date. User documents don'tdo not need to be organized in any particular way, but it is very important for them to have a thorough [[Index (publishing)|index]]. Consistency and simplicity are also very valuable. User documentation is considered to constitute a contract specifying what the software will do. [[API Writer]]s are very well accomplished towards writing good user documents as they would be well aware of the software architecture and programming techniques used. See also [[technical writing]].

User documentation can be produced in a variety of online and print formats.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2775457| title = RH Earle, MA Rosso, KE Alexander (2015) User preferences of software documentation genres. Proceedings of the 33rd Annual International Conference on the Design of Communication (ACM SIGDOC).}}</ref> However, there are three broad ways in which user documentation can be organized.