Open Source Negativism and the Future of Open Source Documentation
October 14, 2014
The article on Linux Insider titled Dan Allen and Sarah White: Documentation Dearth Dooms Open Source Projects discusses the work of entrepreneurs Allen and White. The pair have focused on encouraging and aiding software developers in “superior documentation” for open source software. The article includes an interview with White and Allen explaining the function of their program, called Asciidoctor. Allen states in the interview,
“What we have done with Asciidoctor is make the documentation something of value. We do that by, number one, rewarding the writer. For most software developers of open source software, whatever documentation that is created gets published on the website. So we show the developer how the content looks on a Web page displayed in Asciidoctor. When the software developer sees how minor the content is, that triggers motivation to fill in the gaps.”
According to Sarah White, software developers have had a “stunning” response to the motivation to improve documentation (which includes, White notes, improvements to the homepage and to training materials.) Since their start in November, White claims that there has been a tremendous influx of clients interested in making the sort of improvements that White and Allen offer. In the future, White is particularly interested in ensuring that all documentation is integrated to render well on different types of devices, particularly mobile screens.
Chelsea Kerwin, October 14, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
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