Documentation Tools for Developers: Generators, API Docs, and Wikis

Documentation Tools for Developers: Generators, API Docs, and Wikis

Good documentation is the difference between a library people adopt and one they abandon after five minutes. But "documentation" is not one problem -- it's several. You need prose docs for guides and tutorials, API reference generated from code, interactive playgrounds for REST endpoints, and sometimes a wiki for internal knowledge. Different tools solve different parts of this, and picking the wrong one creates friction that makes your docs rot faster.

Static Site Generators for Docs

These tools take Markdown (or MDX) and produce a documentation website with navigation, search, versioning, and theming.

Docusaurus

Docusaurus is Meta's documentation framework, built on React. It powers docs for React Native, Babel, Jest, and Redux.

npx create-docusaurus@latest my-docs classic

// docusaurus.config.js
module.exports = {
  title: "My Project",
  url: "https://docs.example.com",
  baseUrl: "/",
  themeConfig: {
    navbar: {
      title: "My Project",
      items: [
        { type: "doc", docId: "intro", position: "left", label: "Docs" },
        { type: "docsVersionDropdown", position: "right" },
      ],
    },
  },
  presets: [
    ["classic", {
      docs: {
        sidebarPath: require.resolve("./sidebars.js"),
        editUrl: "https://github.com/my-org/my-project/edit/main/docs/",
      },
    }],
  ],
};

Versioning is Docusaurus's killer feature. Running npm run docusaurus docs:version 2.0 snapshots your entire docs directory, and visitors can switch between versions via a dropdown. If you maintain a library with multiple supported versions, this alone justifies choosing Docusaurus.

Strengths: Versioning, MDX support (embed React components in docs), Algolia DocSearch integration, large plugin ecosystem, i18n.

Weaknesses: Heavy. The build output is a full React SPA -- slower page loads, larger bundles. Build times grow with large doc sets.

Starlight (Astro)

Starlight is Astro's documentation theme. It prioritizes performance and simplicity over features like versioning.

// astro.config.mjs
import { defineConfig } from "astro/config";
import starlight from "@astrojs/starlight";

export default defineConfig({
  integrations: [
    starlight({
      title: "My Docs",
      sidebar: [
        {
          label: "Getting Started",
          items: [
            { label: "Installation", slug: "getting-started/install" },
            { label: "Quick Start", slug: "getting-started/quickstart" },
          ],
        },
        { label: "Guides", autogenerate: { directory: "guides" } },
      ],
    }),
  ],
});

Starlight ships minimal JavaScript. Pages are static HTML by default, with interactive components opt-in via Astro's island architecture. The result is noticeably faster page loads than Docusaurus.

Strengths: Fast builds, fast pages, clean default theme, built-in search (Pagefind), sidebar autogeneration, supports React/Vue/Svelte components.

Weaknesses: No built-in versioning. Smaller ecosystem than Docusaurus.

Mintlify

Mintlify is a hosted documentation platform. You write Markdown in a Git repo, and Mintlify builds, hosts, and serves it.

{
  "name": "My API",
  "navigation": [
    { "group": "Getting Started", "pages": ["introduction", "quickstart"] },
    { "group": "API Reference", "pages": ["api-reference/list-users"] }
  ],
  "api": { "baseUrl": "https://api.example.com" },
  "openapi": "openapi.yaml"
}

The standout feature is the API playground -- it reads your OpenAPI spec and generates interactive "Try It" panels where users can make real API calls from the docs.

Strengths: Beautiful defaults, API playground from OpenAPI, analytics, no infrastructure to manage.

Weaknesses: Paid (limited free tier). Vendor lock-in on configuration and components.

MkDocs (Material for MkDocs)

MkDocs is the dominant documentation tool in the Python ecosystem. With the Material theme, it produces clean, feature-rich sites.

# mkdocs.yml
site_name: My Project
theme:
  name: material
  features: [navigation.tabs, search.suggest, content.code.copy]
plugins:
  - search
  - mkdocstrings:
      handlers:
        python:
          options:
            show_source: true
nav:
  - Home: index.md
  - Getting Started:
    - Installation: getting-started/install.md
  - API Reference: reference/

The mkdocstrings plugin generates API reference directly from Python docstrings -- reference a function with ::: my_module.create_user and it renders with type annotations, descriptions, and source links.

Strengths: Excellent Python integration, polished Material theme, fast builds, good search.

Weaknesses: Python-centric. Not the natural choice for JavaScript/TypeScript projects.

API Documentation

Swagger / OpenAPI

OpenAPI is the standard for describing REST APIs. The spec defines endpoints, parameters, schemas, and authentication in YAML or JSON.

openapi: 3.1.0
info:
  title: Users API
  version: 1.0.0
paths:
  /users:
    get:
      summary: List users
      parameters:
        - name: limit
          in: query
          schema: { type: integer, default: 20 }
      responses:
        "200":
          description: A list of users
          content:
            application/json:
              schema:
                type: array
                items:
                  $ref: "#/components/schemas/User"
components:
  schemas:
    User:
      type: object
      required: [id, name, email]
      properties:
        id: { type: integer }
        name: { type: string }
        email: { type: string, format: email }

Render this spec with different tools depending on your needs:

# Swagger UI -- interactive "Try It Out" button
docker run -p 8080:8080 -e SWAGGER_JSON=/spec/openapi.yaml \
  -v ./openapi.yaml:/spec/openapi.yaml swaggerapi/swagger-ui

# Redoc -- clean three-panel layout, read-only
npx @redocly/cli preview-docs openapi.yaml

# Scalar -- modern UI, interactive, open source
npx @scalar/cli serve openapi.yaml

The key decision is spec-first vs. code-first. Spec-first means you write the YAML by hand and generate server stubs. Code-first means your framework generates the spec from decorators. Both work, but spec-first tends to produce better documentation because the spec is intentionally authored for readers.

TypeDoc

TypeDoc generates API reference documentation from TypeScript source code.

{
  "entryPoints": ["src/index.ts"],
  "out": "docs/api",
  "plugin": ["typedoc-plugin-markdown"],
  "exclude": ["**/*.test.ts"],
  "excludePrivate": true,
  "readme": "none"
}

npx typedoc --plugin typedoc-plugin-markdown --out docs/api

TypeDoc reads your types directly -- no separate annotation language. The typedoc-plugin-markdown plugin outputs Markdown instead of HTML, letting you embed the output in Docusaurus, Starlight, or any other doc site. This is the recommended approach -- generate Markdown reference docs and embed them rather than hosting a separate TypeDoc site.

Output quality depends on your JSDoc comments. Without them, you get a technically accurate type reference that isn't very helpful to readers. For TypeScript projects, TypeDoc replaces standalone JSDoc entirely.

Wiki and Knowledge Base Alternatives

Sometimes you need internal docs not tied to a codebase -- runbooks, onboarding guides, architecture decisions.

Notion is popular but has real drawbacks for technical docs: basic code highlighting, no Git integration, proprietary format, poor export. Fine for lightweight notes, poor for technical content.

Confluence is the enterprise default. It integrates with Jira. The main advantage is that your company probably already has it.

Outline is the best open-source alternative. It stores documents as Markdown, has good search, supports nested collections, and can be self-hosted. If you want a wiki that respects content portability, Outline wins.

Docs-as-code is often the best approach: keep documentation as Markdown files in your Git repo, colocated with code. It goes through the same review process, stays in sync, and is searchable with standard tools. It breaks down when non-engineers need to contribute, at which point Outline is a reasonable compromise.

Comparison Table

Recommendations

Pick your tools based on what you're documenting:

Library with versioned releases: Use Docusaurus. The built-in versioning is worth the heavier build. Configure Algolia DocSearch (free for open source) and add "Edit this page" links.

New project, no versioning needed: Use Starlight. Faster to set up, faster to build, faster for readers. Migrate to Docusaurus later if you outgrow it.

REST API documentation: Start with your OpenAPI spec. Use Redoc for clean readable docs or Swagger UI for interactive testing. Mintlify combines prose docs with an API playground if you don't mind paying.

TypeScript library reference: Use TypeDoc with the Markdown plugin and embed the output in your main doc site. Write JSDoc comments on your public API -- TypeDoc only generates useful docs when the source has good comments.

Python project: MkDocs with Material theme. Add mkdocstrings for API reference. Path of least resistance in the Python ecosystem.

Internal team docs: Start with docs-as-code (Markdown in your repo). If non-engineers need to contribute, use Outline. Avoid Notion for anything with code examples.

General principles:

• Colocate documentation with code whenever possible
• Automate doc generation in CI -- broken docs are worse than no docs
• Write guides by hand; generate reference docs from code
• Review docs in PRs the same way you review code
• One well-maintained doc site is better than three abandoned ones