| title | tags | created | modified | author | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
_PROJECT_ Documentation Analysis |
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YYYY-MM-DD |
YYYY-MM-DD |
_NAME_ (@_HANDLE_) |
TO USE THIS TEMPLATE, search and replace the named IDs:
_PROJECT_: project nameYYYY-MM-DD: creation and modification dates of the analysis document_NAME_: name of the analysis author@_HANDLE_: GitHub handle of the analysis author_PROJECT-WEBSITE_: landing page of the project's information website_PROJECT-DOC-URL_: main page of the technical documentation for the current project revision; this might be on the main website server, for example as PROJECT-WEBSITE/doc_PROJECT-DOC-REPO_: repository where the project technical documentation is stored; this might be its own repo or a directory in the project main repo
For the analysis procedure, see Analysis how-to.
Note: delete this "About this template" section after you have customized this template for a specific project.
This document is an analyzes the effectiveness and completeness of the PROJECT open source software (OSS) project's documentation and website. It is funded by the CNCF Foundation as part of its overall effort to incubate, grow, and graduate open source cloud native software projects.
According to CNCF best practices guidelines, effective documentation is a prerequisite for program graduation. The documentation analysis is the first step of a CNCF process aimed at assisting projects with their documentation efforts.
This document was written to analyze the current state of PROJECT documentation. It aims to provide project leaders with an informed understanding of potential problems in current project documentation. A second implementation document, , outlines an actionable plan for improvement. A third document is an issues list of issues to be added to the project documentation repository. These issues can be taken up by contributors to improve the documentation.
This document:
- Analyzes the current PROJECT technical documentation and website
- Compares existing documentation against the CNCF’s standards
- Recommends a program of key improvements with the largest return on investment
The documentation discussed here includes the entire contents of the website, the technical documentation, and documentation for contributors and users on the PROJECT GitHub repository.
The PROJECT website and documentation are written in [Markdown, ReStructured Text, other] and are compiled using the [Hugo, Docusaurus, Sphinx, other] static site generator with the [Docsy, other] theme and served from [the Netlify platform, other]. The site's code is stored on the PROJECT GitHub repo.
- Website: PROJECT-WEBSITE
- Documentation: PROJECT-DOC-URL
- Website repo: PROJECT-DOC-REPO
- [Other; might include a demo server, governance site, or other relevant repositories]
- Other PROJECT repos: [In general, do not include sub-projects or related "ecosystem" projects]
This document is divided into three sections that represent three major areas of concern:
- Project documentation: concerns documentation for users of the PROJECT software, aimed at people who intend to use the project software
- Contributor documentation: concerns documentation for new and existing contributors to the PROJECT OSS project
- Website: concerns the mechanics of publishing the documentation, and includes branding, website structure, and maintainability
Each section begins with summary ratings based on a rubric with appropriate criteria for the section, then proceeds to:
- Comments: observations about the existing documentation, with a focus on how it does or does not help PROJECT users achieve their goals.
- Recommendations: suggested changes that would improve the effectiveness of the documentation.
The accompanying implementation document breaks the recommendations down into concrete actions that can be implemented by project contributors. Its focus is on drilling down to specific, achievable work that can be completed in constrained blocks of time. Ultimately, the implementation items are decomposed into a series of [issues] and entered as GitHub project-doc-website/issues.
Readers interested only in actionable improvements should skip this document and read the implementation plan and [issues] list.
Readers interested in the current state of the documentation and the reasoning behind the recommendations should read the section of this document pertaining to their area of concern:
Examples of CNCF documentation that demonstrate the analysis criteria are linked from the criteria specification.
This analysis measures documentation against CNCF project maturity standards, and suggests possible improvements. In most cases there is more than one way to do things. Few recommendations here are meant to be prescriptive. Rather, the recommended implementations represent the reviewers' experience with how to apply documentation best practices. In other words, borrowing terminology from the lexicon of RFCs, the changes described here should be understood as "recommended" or "should" at the strongest, and "optional" or "may" in many cases. Any "must" or "required" actions are clearly denoted as such, and pertain to legal requirements such as copyright and licensing issues.
AUTHOR NOTE: Pick the CNCF maturity level of the project:
PROJECT is a graduated project of CNCF. This means that the project should have very high standards for documentation.
AUTHOR NOTE: or
PROJECT is an incubating project of CNCF. This means that the project should be developing professional-quality documentation alongside the project code.
| Criterion | Rating (1-5) |
|---|---|
| Information architecture | rating (1-5) |
| New user content | rating (1-5) |
| Content maintainability | rating (1-5) |
| Content creation processes | rating (1-5) |
| Inclusive language | rating (1-5) |
AUTHOR NOTE: make any overall comments about the Project Documentation here.
The following sections contain brief assessments of each element of the Project Documentation rubric.
AUTHOR NOTE: For each heading below, discuss how well the in-scope items, and especially the technical documentation, meet these criteria. (Criteria are copied from criteria.md)
The overall structure (pages/subpages/sections/subsections) of your project documentation. We evaluate on the following:
- Is there high level conceptual/“About” content? Is the documentation feature complete? (i.e., each product feature is documented)
- Are there step-by-step instructions (tasks, tutorials) documented for features?
- Are there any key features which are documented but missing task documentation?
- Is the “happy path”/most common use case documented? Does task and tutorial content demonstrate atomicity and isolation of concerns? (Are tasks clearly named according to user goals?)
- If the documentation does not suffice, is there a clear escalation path for users needing more help? (FAQ, Troubleshooting)
- If the product exposes an API, is there a complete reference?
- Is content up to date and accurate?
New users are the most avid users of documentation, and need content specifically for them. We evaluate on the following:
- Is “getting started” clearly labeled? (“Getting started”, “Installation”, “First steps”, etc.)
- Is installation documented step-by-step?
- If needed, are multiple OSes documented?
- Do users know where to go after reading the getting started guide?
- Is your new user content clearly signposted on your site’s homepage or at the top of your information architecture?
- Is there sample code or other example content that can easily be copy-pasted?
As a project scales, concerns like localized (translated) content and versioning become large maintenance burdens, particularly if you don’t plan for them.
We evaluate on the following:
- Is your documentation searchable?
- Are you planning for localization/internationalization with regards to site directory structure? Is a localization framework present?
- Do you have a clearly documented method for versioning your content?
Documentation is only as useful as it is accurate and well-maintained, and requires the same kind of review and approval processes as code.
We evaluate on the following:
- Is there a clearly documented (ongoing) contribution process for documentation?
- Does your code release process account for documentation creation & updates?
- Who reviews and approves documentation pull requests?
- Does the website have a clear owner/maintainer?
Creating inclusive project communities is a key goal for all CNCF projects.
We evaluate on the following:
- Are there any customer-facing utilities, endpoints, class names, or feature names that use non-recommended words as documented by the Inclusive Naming Initiative website?
- Does the project use language like "simple", "easy", etc.?
AUTHOR NOTE: Write general recommendations based on the comments from the previous section.
AUTHOR NOTE: Pick the CNCF maturity level of the project:
PROJECT is a graduated project of CNCF. This means that the project should have very high standards for documentation.
AUTHOR NOTE: or
PROJECT is an incubating project of CNCF. This means that the project should be developing professional-quality documentation alongside the project code.
| Criterion | Rating (1-5) |
|---|---|
| Communication methods documented | rating (1-5) |
| Beginner friendly issue backlog | rating (1-5) |
| “New contributor” getting started content | rating (1-5) |
| Project governance documentation | rating (1-5) |
AUTHOR NOTE: make any overall comments about the Contributor Documentation here.
The following sections contain brief assessments of each element of the Contributor Documentation rubric.
AUTHOR NOTE: For each heading below, discuss how well the in-scope items meet these criteria. Keep in mind that much of the contributor documentation might be contained in the documentation repository. (Criteria are copied from criteria.md)
One of the easiest ways to attract new contributors is making sure they know how to reach you.
We evaluate on the following:
- Is there a Slack/Discord/Discourse/etc. community and is it prominently linked from your website?
- Is there a direct link to your GitHub organization/repository?
- Are weekly/monthly project meetings documented? Is it clear how someone can join those meetings?
- Are mailing lists documented?
We evaluate on the following:
- Are docs issues well-triaged?
- Is there a clearly marked way for new contributors to make code or documentation contributions (i.e. a “good first issue” label)?
- Are issues well-documented (i.e., more than just a title)?
- Are issues maintained for staleness?
Open source is complex and projects have many processes to manage that. Are processes easy to understand and written down so that new contributors can jump in easily?
We evaluate on the following:
- Do you have a community repository or section on your website?
- Is there a document specifically for new contributors/your first contribution?
- Do new users know where to get help?
One of the CNCF’s core project values is open governance.
We evaluate on the following:
- Is project governance clearly documented?
AUTHOR NOTE: Write general recommendations based on the comments from the previous section.
AUTHOR NOTE: Pick the CNCF maturity level of the project:
PROJECT is a graduated project of CNCF. This means that the project should have very high standards for documentation.
AUTHOR NOTE: or
PROJECT is an incubating project of CNCF. This means that the project should be developing professional-quality documentation alongside the project code.
| Criterion | Rating (1-5) |
|---|---|
| Single-source for all files | rating (1-5) |
| Meets min website req. (for maturity level) | rating (1-5) |
| Usability, accessibility, and design | rating (1-5) |
| Branding and design | rating (1-5) |
| Case studies/social proof | rating (1-5) |
| SEO, Analytics, and site-local search | rating (1-5) |
| Maintenance planning | rating (1-5) |
| A11y plan & implementation | rating (1-5) |
| Mobile-first plan & impl. | rating (1-5) |
| HTTPS access & HTTP redirect | rating (1-5) |
| Google Analytics 4 for production only | rating (1-5) |
| Indexing allowed for production server only | rating (1-5) |
| Intra-site / local search | rating (1-5) |
| Account custodians are documented | rating (1-5) |
AUTHOR NOTE: make any overall comments about the Website and documentation infrastructure here.
The following sections contain brief assessments of each element of the Website and documentation infrastructure rubric.
AUTHOR NOTE: for each heading below, discuss how well the in-scope items meet these criteria. Keep in mind that much of the website infrastructure criteria depend on the tools (static site generator, website framework and hosting, analytics tools, etc.) and processes (project CI, release procedures, governance, etc.) used to produce the documentation. (Criteria are copied from criteria.md)
Source files for all website pages should reside in a single repo. Among other problems, keeping source files in two places:
- confuses contributors
- requires you to keep two sources in sync
- increases the likelihood of errors
- makes it more complicated to generate the documentation from source files
Ideally, all website files should be in the website repo itself. Alternatively, files should be brought into the website repo via git submodules.
If a project chooses to keep source files in multiple repos, they need a clearly documented strategy for managing mirrored files and new contributions.
Listed here are the minimal website requirements for projects based on their maturity level, either incubating or graduated. (These are the only two levels for which a tech docs analysis can be requested.)
| Criterion | Incubating Requirement | Graduated Requirement |
|---|---|---|
| Website guidelines | All guidelines satisfied | All guidelines satisfied |
| Docs analysis (this) | Requested through CNCF service desk | All follow-up actions addressed |
| Project doc: stakeholders | Roles identified and doc needs documented | All stakeholder need identified |
| Project doc: hosting | Hosted directly | Hosted directly |
| Project doc: user docs | Comprehensive, addressing most stakeholder needs | Fully addresses needs of key stakeholders |
Most CNCF websites are accessed from mobile and other non-desktop devices at least 10-20% of the time. Planning for this early in your website's design will be much less effort than retrofitting a desktop-first design.
- Is the website usable from mobile?
- Are doc pages readable?
- Are all / most website features accessible from mobile -- such as the top-nav, site search and in-page table of contents?
- Might a mobile-first design make sense for your project?
Plan for suitable accessibility measures for your website. For example:
- Are color contrasts significant enough for color-impaired readers?
- Are most website features usable using a keyboard only?
- Does text-to-speech offer listeners a good experience?
It is up to each project to set their own guidelines.
CNCF seeks to support enterprise-ready open source software. A key aspect of this is branding and marketing.
We evaluate on the following:
- Is there an easily recognizable brand for the project (logo + color scheme) clearly identifiable?
- Is the brand used across the website consistently?
- Is the website’s typography clean and well-suited for reading?
One of the best ways to advertise an open source project is to show other organizations using it.
We evaluate on the following:
- Are there case studies available for the project and are they documented on the website?
- Are there user testimonials available?
- Is there an active project blog?
- Are there community talks for the project and are they present on the website?
- Is there a logo wall of users/participating organizations?
SEO helps users find your project and it's documentation, and analytics helps you monitor site traffic and diagnose issues like page 404s. Intra-site search, while optional, can offer your readers a site-focused search results.
We evaluate on the following:
- Analytics:
- Is analytics enabled for the production server?
- Is analytics disabled for all other deploys?
- If your project used Google Analytics, have you migrated to GA4?
- Can Page-not-found (404) reports easily be generated from you site analytics? Provide a sample of the site's current top-10 404s.
- Is site indexing supported for the production server, while disabled for website previews and builds for non-default branches?
- Is local intra-site search available from the website?
- Are the current custodian(s) of the following accounts clearly documented: analytics, Google Search Console, site-search (such as Google CSE or Algolia)
Website maintenance is an important part of project success, especially when project maintainers aren’t web developers.
We evaluate on the following:
- Is your website tooling well supported by the community (i.e., Hugo with the Docsy theme) or commonly used by CNCF projects (our recommended tech stack?)
- Are you actively cultivating website maintainers from within the community?
- Are site build times reasonable?
- Do site maintainers have adequate permissions?
- Is your website accessible via HTTPS?
- Does HTTP access, if any, redirect to HTTPS?
AUTHOR NOTE: Write general recommendations based on the comments from the previous section.
The numeric rating values used in this document are as follows
- Not present
- Needs improvement
- Meets standards
- Meets or exceeds standards
- Exemplary