Writing documentation¶

This section gives some guidelines to write consistent documentation for GeoNetwork.

Build the docs¶

git clone https://github.com/geonetwork/doc
cd doc
mvn clean install

Edit the reStructuredText files¶

To update the documentation, use a text editor to edit .rst files. Save your changes, build the documentation and open the HTML files to preview the changes. When your changes are ready to be submitted to the project, follow the steps in Making a pull request.

Sphinx¶

This section gives some useful tips about using Sphinx.

Don’t introduce any new warnings¶

When building the doc, Sphinx prints out warnings about broken links, syntax errors, … Don’t introduce new ones.

It’s best to delete the build directory and completely rebuild the docs, to check for any warnings:

mvn clean install

Links¶

Images¶

Place images in an img folder in the directory where the rst file is located. Use images with:

.. figure:: img/thumbprint.png

Code block¶

Use the following directive to highlight code block:

.. code-block:: xml

Reference to a section within a file¶

When creating a new page, add a reference on top of the file:

.. _writing-documentation:

This reference could then be used to link to that page or section:

:ref:`writing_documentation`

Link to GitHub resources¶

The conf.py contains a set of external links definition.

* :issue:`123` to link to an issue
* :pr:`123` to link to a pull request
* :code:`web/pom.xml` to link to a file in the source code
* :repo:`schema_plugins` to link to a repository
* :wiki:`Meeting2015Bern` to link to a wiki page

Example, link to the Bern User Meeting (See wiki page Meeting2015Bern).

Substitutions¶

Substitutions are useful to define a value that’s needed in many places (eg. the location of a file, etc.).

The values are defined in rst_epilog in conf.py:

.. |jdbc.properties| replace:: WEB-INF/config-db/jdbc.properties

Use them when appropriate:

Configure the database in |jdbc.properties| ...

After installation look to |install.homepage|_ on your web browser.

versionadded, versionchanged and deprecated¶

Use Sphinx’s versionadded and versionchanged directives to mark new or changed features. For example:

Creating overview from WMS
==========================

.. versionadded:: 3.0

In the *add overview panel*, select the *add from WMS* link to create
an image from the WMS referenced in the metadata record to illustrate
the dataset in a specific area.

...

When using the versionchanged directive, a sentence explaining what changed is usually relevant:

Configuring LDAP
================

.. versionchanged:: 2.10.0
   Previous versions was setting LDAP parameters from the administration
   panel.

...

Use deprecated directive when a feature is no longer available.

seealso¶

Many sections include a list of references to module documentation or external documents. These lists are created using the seealso directive typically placed in a section just before any subsections.