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[joomla] Dev/documentation issues

Ajai Khattri ajai at bitblit.net
Wed Aug 15 17:15:15 EDT 2007


On Wed, 15 Aug 2007, Mitch Pirtle wrote:

> Honestly I can only think of a very few projects that have adequate
> documentation, let alone great documentation. The biggest problems are
> compounded:
> 
> * The code changes quickly
> * The people that write documentation are usually not developers, and
> therefore the last people to learn about the stuff they are trying to
> document
> 
> By the time the writers have a decent draft written up, it's time to
> start all over again. That's a huge demotivator.

I dont mean to pick on Joomla (though it has caused me to click endlessly 
on the developer and docs site trying to find something). But what 
would be more useful (and maybe easier from a documentation standpoint), 
is to have both a wiki and a code snippets site. Sometimes its better 
to have a piece of code showing an example rather than several pages of 
explanation. A wiki / snippet is also easier to update for both developers 
and documentors.

Im using symfony (symfony-project.com) in my day job - not only does the 
symfony site have excellent docs (the Apress book is available online) but 
they have forums, a wiki, a snippets site, some excellent tutorials and 
examples, as well as the usual news feeds and a blog. I have an old site 
originally built in Mambo which Im considering rebuilding in symfony 
purely because I know it will be easier to find the information I need 
rather than for Joomla.

Im sure Joomla has many more developers than for symfony which makes it 
all the more galling.



-- 
Aj.




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