3 ms·
This is just my opinion, but if you want any other contributors besides yourself, I think you definitely want API docs. Just because it's not exposed to the pub
by jharger 11y ago
This is just my opinion, but if you want any other contributors besides yourself, I think you definitely want API docs. Just because it's not exposed to the public doesn't mean nobody cares what a function/class does.
If it has a DSL, or any sort of scripting, as a user you damn well want it to have API docs. It's super frustrating to have a use case the author didn't think about, and you have to figure it out via trial and error because the author didn't think it'd be worth spending a few hours documenting what each thing is supposed to do.
Don't think that just because some projects were successful without API documentation, maybe because they served a particular niche, that means you can just ignore documentation because you feel it's not necessary.
- lighthawk 11y agoI think you and I have different idea of what API docs are. I think that good documentation for usage is a great idea, but not all projects need formal API docs, because not all of them intend for the classes in their project to be used as a library. I agree with you that if your code intends to be used as a library, you should provide API docs. And, if you expose a service then you should probably provide API service documentation with examples. I'd add also that usage examples can sometimes go much further than API docs to clarifying things.