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Ask HN: What's the best documentation you've ever read (or written)?

6 pointsby kincardineover 9 years ago
I&#x27;ve been thinking a lot about documentation and how to get a user up to speed on a code base as quickly and effortlessly (on the part of the user) as possible.<p>I know &quot;best&quot; can be somewhat arbitrary or subjective, but use whichever metric you think is most relevant (organization, clarity, etc...). And, if you&#x27;d like, let me know what you think &quot;best&quot; should mean in relation to documentation quality.<p>Also, I know this question has been asked before, but those threads are all several years old, so in that time the documentation pool has obviously changed (and hopefully improved).

5 comments

bitshepherdover 9 years ago
<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;freebsd.org&#x2F;handbook" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;freebsd.org&#x2F;handbook</a><p>It&#x27;s a comprehensive, yet not too dense, set of documentation for getting people up to speed on how to do things with FreeBSD. You may not find a better one even today.
zbjornsonover 9 years ago
The reference pages for Mathematica are by far the best docs I&#x27;ve seen for a programming language. They&#x27;re thorough and each example can be evaluated in place.<p>Online version here [1] is not evaluatable and is rendered to images, but otherwise it&#x27;s the same content as the desktop version. Specific example [2].<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;reference.wolfram.com&#x2F;language&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;reference.wolfram.com&#x2F;language&#x2F;</a> [2] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;reference.wolfram.com&#x2F;language&#x2F;ref&#x2F;Histogram.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;reference.wolfram.com&#x2F;language&#x2F;ref&#x2F;Histogram.html</a>
codegeekover 9 years ago
I like the official git documentation. There are many tutorials out there but reading through the official doc always makes things clearer to me at least<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;git-scm.com&#x2F;doc" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;git-scm.com&#x2F;doc</a><p>I also like Stripe documentation<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;stripe.com&#x2F;docs" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;stripe.com&#x2F;docs</a>
drakenotover 9 years ago
ZeroMQ Guide has frequently been mentioned on HN as one of the better pieces of software documentation:<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;zguide.zeromq.org&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;zguide.zeromq.org&#x2F;</a><p>It is useful not just for using ZeroMQ, but about learning about distributed systems in general.
apoorv_aroraover 9 years ago
<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.digifire.in&#x2F;2016&#x2F;02&#x2F;06&#x2F;interview-with-apoorv-arora-co-founder-at-baatna&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.digifire.in&#x2F;2016&#x2F;02&#x2F;06&#x2F;interview-with-apoorv-aro...</a><p>It&#x27;s a recently written tech interview for a startup named Baatna. Good read!