Ruff! documentation generator

Ruff! (Runtime function formatter) is a documentation generation system for programs written in the Tcl programming language. Ruff! uses runtime introspection in conjunction with comment analysis to generate reference documentation for Tcl programs with minimal effort on the programmer's part.

See https://ruff.magicsplat.com for features and reference documentation. Source repository lives at https://github.com/apnadkarni/ruff.

Why Ruff!

Ruff! produces documentation that not only requires less duplication of effort from the programmer, but is also more complete, more accurate and more maintainable.

• Comments in source code do not have to be reproduced for documentation purposes.

• Ruff! requires minimal markup in the comments making it lightweight as well as reducing clutter.

• Supports inline formatting using Markdown syntax.

• Embedded diagrams in multiple formats

• Program elements like command arguments, defaults and class relationships like inheritance are automatically derived.

• Maintenance is less of a burden as documentation is automatically updated with source modification such as changes to defaults, addition of mix-ins etc.

On the output side,

• Ruff! supports multiple formats (HTML, Markdown, reStructuredText, Asciidoc and nroff).

• Generated documentation can optionally be split across multiple pages.

• Hyperlinks between program elements, and optionally source code, make navigation easy and efficient.

• A table of contents and optional searchable index permits quick location of command and class documentation.

• Class relationships are extracted and the full API for a class, with inherited and mixed-in methods and properties, is flattened and summarized.

• HTML output supports navigation and user-selectable themes.

For additional examples of Ruff! generated documentation, see

iocp, cffi, CAWT, MAWT, PAWT, SpiceGenTcl, apave, baltip, hl-tcl, tcl-promise, tomato, obex, Woof! and tcl-vix.

Release notes for 3.0.4

• Avoid flash when loading dark pages

Release notes for 3.0.3

Note this is a major release and there may be subtle incompatibilities with 2.x releases in both parsing of input and generated output.

• New output formats reStructuredText (Sphinx) and Asciidoc
• New command coverage to list undocumented or partially documented components
• New command line interface 2.x incompatibility
• Support for numbered lists
• Support for block quotes
• Support for tables
• Support for HTML entities
• Include OO class methods in documentation
• Provision for class preambles, oo::configurable property descriptions and Tk-like option documentation via _ruffClassHook_ (Tcl 9 only)
• Customizable namespace headings
• Customizable per-namespace options
• New -onlyexports / --only-exports option to only document exported commands
• Order in which class and command sections are displayed is now based on the -include / --include option
• Program elements in navigation pane now use a monospace font.
• Tcl core built-ins are ignored when documenting global namespace (bug fix)
• The document command no longer supports supports the -preeval option. Do any required evaluation in the caller before invoking document. 2.x incompatibility

Release notes for 2.7

• Added a copy button for fenced blocks (thanks @nico-robert).

Release notes for 2.6

• Added #ruff includeformatters|excludeformatters directives to include or exclude content for specific formatters (thanks to George Yashin).

Release notes for 2.5

• Better documentation of TclOO properties to include custom setter/getter descriptions
• Bug fixes in nroff output.

Release notes for 2.4

• Support for TclOO properties in Tcl 9
• Support for language specifier in fenced blocks

Release notes for 2.3

• Collapsible details section for procedure description option when -compact 1 is specified. Note generated output with -compact 1 has changed.
• Bug fix. Ensure diagrams fit in page width
• Bug fix. Index page tooltip synopsis visibility in dark themes.

Release notes for 2.2

• Support for embedded text formatted diagrams (ditaa, PlantUML etc.)
• Alignment and linkable numbered captions for fenced blocks and diagrams.
• Fixed minor display artifacts.

Release notes for 2.1

This release mainly has cosmetic changes in presentation.

• Ensemble command includes table to subcommands.
• Show command synopsis in navigation pane tooltip.
• Tweaks to themes and navigation.
• Bug fix: broken link to index page.

Release notes for 2.0

• Added Nroff formatter for Unix manpages.
• Added themes with end-user selection.
• Added end-user control for positioning navigation pane.
• Classes defined with metaclasses are recognized.
• Proc and method synopsis overrides, for example to distinguish invocation options.
• Web assets are linked by default (option -linkassets) instead of being embedded.
• Incompatibility: Generated HTML and CSS templates have changed and require modern browsers (no Internet Explorer support).
• Incompatibility: The -stylesheets option is not supported.
• Incompatibility: The -navigation option only takes scrolled sticky as valid values.
• Incompatibility: The -output option is not supported. Use -outfile and -outdir instead.
• Incompatibility: Output file names use hyphen as a separator instead of underscore.
• Bug fixes

NOTE 2.0 HAS SEVERAL INCOMPATIBILITIES VIS-A-VIS 1.x IN OPTIONS AND GENERATED OUTPUT FORMAT. See above Release notes for 2.0.