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how to document existing web application

Posted: Fri Aug 10, 2007 5:22 am
by raghavan20
hello, i would like to know how to document an existing web application so that it can be used by new people to read, understand and work with the web application. i would like to know which sections should be covered such as, api-level documentation, uml, general purpose/functionality of app, config files, controllers, models, templates, etc. Are there any good tutorials around that can explain the things to cover while developing documentation for developers? Do you also recommend using any specific tools for the purpose?

Thanks, Rag.

Posted: Fri Aug 10, 2007 10:35 am
by RobertGonzalez
I use PHPDocumenter to document all of my code as I develop it. It provides some very good use documents as well as API documents.

On a side note, I want to eat my own fingers because I keep spelling docuemtns wrong. :evil:

Posted: Fri Aug 10, 2007 2:29 pm
by alex.barylski
Doxygen does a pretty good job of generating API docs even if you don't have any Javadoc type comments.

Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2007 3:18 am
by raghavan20
thanks for your comments.

how many of you use wiki to document application? is there any particular approach while documenting using wiki? is it possible to include php formatted code in wiki just like how we display php code in forums?

when it comes to web, which are the main technical things do you think one should document?

Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2007 5:31 am
by Chris Corbyn
raghavan20 wrote:thanks for your comments.

how many of you use wiki to document application? is there any particular approach while documenting using wiki? is it possible to include php formatted code in wiki just like how we display php code in forums?

when it comes to web, which are the main technical things do you think one should document?
I use a wiki. API documentation is nice and all that so I include it, but you don't get the same level of guidance with an API as you do with a wiki. It really depends what wiki you use as to what the featureset will be but I doubt you'll find a wiki that doesn't at least support

Code: Select all

<?php code_here() ?>
Finding ones that have syntax highlighting is still easy though. Dokuwiki is solid in my opinion, but the one is Trac is amazing. Both of these support syntax highlighting.

GoogleCode's wiki system uses your subversion repository which I think is quite cool. I thought about writing a subversion-backed wiki myself once.

Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2007 7:14 am
by raghavan20
hello chris, thanks for your reply. i have now started using dokuwiki based on your recommendation. i think it would take me a day or two to familiarize with important features. i was trying moinmoin wiki, but it needed pythong and i dont really know how to use python in apache. :cry: luckily dokuwiki is in php to my rescue :) this does also have some kind of repository to store file versions. i have not personally used CVS or Subversion and I think this wiki is kewl.

Posted: Mon Aug 13, 2007 11:18 pm
by seodevhead
I have been looking for a general php/mysql wiki software to use to document my web applications. I notice dokuwiki uses flat files... which is a bit of a drag... I move my stuff around so much and have some permission stuff going on... I'd rather use MySQL.

Anyone know of a good php/mysql wiki? From the research that I've done.. it seems that MediaWiki ( http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki ) is the leader... no?

Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 10:56 am
by RobertGonzalez
http://www.wikimatrix.org/ is a cool little resource to start searching at.

Another one is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... i_software, which lists several features of the software pack in a nice easy to read table.

Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 11:06 am
by raghavan20
Everah wrote:http://www.wikimatrix.org/ is a cool little resource to start searching at.

Another one is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... i_software, which lists several features of the software pack in a nice easy to read table.
wikimatrix is a good site; i should have got this earlier. no problem, i may use a different wiki to document another project.


for chris: i could not really find plugins to change the view of the dokuwiki. you got any links for it?

Thanks to all.

Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 1:48 pm
by seodevhead
Thanks for that website. It is a bit overwhelming... but from what I can tell, MediaWiki seems to be the "WordPress" of wiki software... am I wrong here?

Posted: Tue Aug 14, 2007 2:05 pm
by RobertGonzalez
Yeah, mediawiki is the most commonly thought of application when you hear the word Wiki,