From 40e78548db8748a58da88cdded60dcae459f0382 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Aria Minaei <aria.minaei@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2022 18:14:40 +0100
Subject: [PATCH] Document docs gotchas

---
 CONTRIBUTING.md          |  2 ++
 contributing/api-docs.md | 52 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 2 files changed, 54 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 contributing/api-docs.md

diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
index 6bda2c9..c725148 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTING.md
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -128,6 +128,8 @@ To generate the API docs, run the `build:api-docs` from the root of the repo:
 $ yarn build:api-docs /path/to/theatre-docs/docs/api/ # this will empty the /api folder and regenerate the markdown files
 ```
 
+Learn more about api documentation [here](./contributing/api-docs.md).
+
 ## Project structure
 
 The [monorepo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monorepo) consists of:
diff --git a/contributing/api-docs.md b/contributing/api-docs.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..836f89c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/contributing/api-docs.md
@@ -0,0 +1,52 @@
+# Writing API docs
+
+We use [API extractor](https://api-extractor.com/pages/setup/generating_docs/) to generate API docs in markdown. We put the markdown files in the [theatre-docs](https://github.com/ariaminaei/theatre-docs/) repo, which also contains the tutorials and guides.
+
+To generate the API docs, run the `build:api-docs` from the root of the repo:
+
+```sh
+$ yarn build:api-docs /path/to/theatre-docs/docs/api/ # this will empty the /api folder and regenerate the markdown files
+```
+
+## JSDoc/TSDoc gotchas
+
+We are using TSDoc for documentation generation, IDEs use JSDoc for tooltips. TSDoc and JSDoc have subtle differences. We need to optimize for both.
+
+* Most users will read our documentation inside their IDEs. 
+
+### `@example`
+
+IDEs automatically wrap example sections  in ``` if they aren't already. This means you can't use non-code explanations in example sections, like TSDoc examples do. 
+
+Some IDEs have problems with multiple example sections.
+
+WebStorm doesn’t highlight examples if they are wrapped in ```.
+
+api-documenter doesn’t highlight examples if they aren’t wrapped in ```.
+
+### Guidelines
+
+- Only use one `@example` section
+- Use a single code block in it, no explanations
+- Wrap the code block in ```ts ... ```
+- If you need to explain the code, use code comments
+
+#### `@typeParam`
+
+api-documenter doesn’t generate documentation for it.
+
+#### `@link`
+
+While in JSDoc you can specify paths relative to the current declaration, TSDoc requires everything to be specified relative to the entry point. That is, if `bar` is a member of `Foo`, and `Foo` is exported in the entry, you need to refer to `bar` as `Foo.bar`, even inside `Foo`.
+
+JSDoc allows separating the link text from the link either with a space or using “|”. TSDoc only supports “|”, *and* you mustn’t have spaces around it. So for example `{@link MyClass | go here}` would be rendered incorrectly, whereas `{@link MyClass|go here}` would be correct.
+
+#### `@param`
+
+api-documenter won’t render the documentation for object properties, but document them anyway, IDEs do.
+
+Since documentation is only rendered for the object and not for its properties, make sure to include examples for these properties.
+
+#### `@see`
+
+The `@see` tag is not rendered by api-documenter.
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