Is there a way to generate Javascript API documentation like the Google Closure Library API Documentation?

javascript documentation-generation google-closure google-closure-library
Homer6 picture Homer6 · Sep 29, 2010 · Viewed 18.7k times · Source

I'm trying to find a tool that generates HTML documentation for my Javascript source code.

Does anyone know if the tool that Google uses to generate the interface at the following URLs is open source? Would I be able to generate similar output?

http://closure-library.googlecode.com/svn/docs/class_goog_proto2_Serializer.html

http://closure-library.googlecode.com/svn/docs/namespace_goog_date.html

http://closure-library.googlecode.com/svn/docs/namespace_goog_events.html

http://closure-library.googlecode.com/svn/docs/class_goog_gears_Database.html

http://closure-library.googlecode.com/svn/docs/class_goog_ui_DatePicker.html

I'm aware of http://code.google.com/p/jsdoc-toolkit/

But I'd like to know if the specific generator that Google uses is available for me to use for my own source (which is going to be open source, if that matters).

Thanks in advance...

Answer

haylem picture haylem · Oct 19, 2010

Google Closure + JSDoc

As you mentioned yourself in your comment, they build on JSDoc Toolkit to add special annotations used by the Closure Compiler for type-checking and other things, but this means you can also just use JSDoc on top of closure code to generate your documentation. Generating an output with the desired look and feel is then only a matter of writing your own template and stylesheet.

The Google Closure Tools are all open source except for some bits that aren't disclosed at the moment. In any case, you can have a look at the documentation and source code and see what they use to generate Javadocs.

ExtJS + Ext-Doc

Another one you could possibly have a look at for inspiration and to see how they do it is the online doc for ExtJS. I find it a bit confusing to navigate at first, but you get used to it fairly quickly. An open source project, Ext-Doc, generates documentation with a similar style, though it is now a bit outdated.

YUI Doc

As mentioned by Matthew Manela, YUI Doc produces pretty good online documentation as well.

My advice would be to go for JSDoc as it is the de-facto standard for many tools and it reflects Java practices, but it's really up to what you want.

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