Google, Microsoft pitch in some spare change to keep Mozilla's Web Docs online bible alive

Google, Microsoft, and friends have pitched in about half a million bucks to create a project seemingly designed to prop up the Mozilla Developer Network (MDN) Web Docs. This freely available documentation is an indispensable bible for anyone working with HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and similar technologies to build web apps and …

[veti]

Niche skill

For almost ten years, I was employed by a software company specifically so that none of the developers would have to write user docs. Just me.

Which was fine when there were only a dozen of them, but by the time I left it had grown to over 50 developers, and I had only the haziest idea what most of them were doing.

Microsoft's documentation is, of course, unspeakably awful and completely impossible to navigate. Google's is, if anything, even worse. I'm glad they both recognise the value of having someone who actually gives a fuck, but I'd be gladder if they extended the scope to cover both those companies' range of products.

[Daedalus]

Re: Niche skill

My sentiments exactly. Microsoft docs are accurately unhelpful, while Linux man pages tend to be comprehensively incomprehensible. My particular beef with M$ is the way their doc pages tend to give you trivial or pedantic amounts of info ("A FUBAR is a function to BAR a FU"), advertise that "you can do this! and this!" and then direct you to another page for "more info" which turns out to be "more of the same". In come cases a "suck it and see" approach is quicker than reading up on the topic.

[David Given]

Re: Niche skill

One of the things which drives me to rage is when 'man foo' produces a placeholder man page telling me to use 'info foo' instead... and then 'info foo' just displays the man page. I wish the FSF would just bloody write some proper man pages.

[Philip Stott]

Re: Niche skill

Wasn't always that way.

I'm showing my age here, but I remember switching from Borland C++ to MS Visual C++ for exactly the reason that all their tools and good documentation could be found on their MSDN discs.

It was once they switched to online docs that the rot set in. Any technologies they wanted to ditch (silerlight anyone) would no longer be linked to, and their favoured new technologies, recently. NET V5 would be favoured in the docs even though NET V4.8 or lower is probably the largest installed base.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Niche skill

I'll show my greater age and declare that documentation has been going downhill since IBM's software manuals.

(I've still got a green card from back before it was associated with immigration.)

[bpfh]

Re: Niche skill

Oh, an old memory of finding in a cupboard 2 snap locked binders with volume one and two of the IBM C compiler. I didn’t think of snaffeling them. I now regret it, that and the unopened packs of OS/2 2.11 - just to show my grand kids what IT used to be now that I’ve become the dinosaur I used to joke about!!

[captain veg]

Re: Niche skill

This space left intentionally blank.

-A.

[bpfh]

Re: Niche skill

Oh This. Have an upvote. VB6 days, the MSDN used to be a great repo of information and examples, and even some of the VC++ guys had examples of creating anonymous functions in VB allowing you function by function access to the win32 api. About 15 years ago, saved my bacon a couple of times.

[IGotOut]

Surprised.

Didn't think either of these knew about web standards.

[gv]

Re: Surprised.

They have to know about the standards so they can work out the most effective way to subvert them.

[Ken Moorhouse]

MDN

micros~1 are putting their hands in their pocket on the basis that the "M" stands for Microsoft.

[Dan 55]

Interesting

On the face of it seems neither Google or MS could give money to Mozilla so they could maintain their docs, but they can set up an organisation to edit their docs while Mozilla's still gasping for air.

[doublelayer]

Re: Interesting

I think it's probably good. Mozilla can't take this money and spend it on something else. That means we don't have to worry about Mozilla failing to support the documentation and any company which doesn't trust Mozilla can still donate specifically to support the docs.

Given what we know about their finances, the claims of problems are not always proven true. Last time they claimed a budget problem, they killed the security team then got the same Google funding they already had, leading some to wonder if they just wanted to kill the security team and perhaps have more money for something less important. At some point, it's useful to decide how you want your donation spent if you're unsure you can trust them to allocate it. Meanwhile, Mozilla still maintains ownership and control; the extra organization merely maintains it with a chunk of cash, but can't override Mozilla's instructions on the docs let alone anything else.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Interesting

"...while Mozilla's still gasping for air.

The tops of skulls can make excellent bridges. As long as Firefox exists, Google can't be rightfully charged as a monopoly but, the doc.'s and everything else Mozilla has is up for grabs. It doesn't take a tin foil hat to see that there's already a power play being drawn up by Spy Vs. Spy Google and Microsoft.

[Dave559]

RTFM

What, are you saying that, yet again, someone has forgotten the importance of good, up to date, well maintained, and well written documentation? You would think this had never happened before (note the notes about a well-meaning project, with the big names behind it, gradually crumbling to dust). Will they also forget it about it again, after a couple of years of initial enthusiasm? Let's hope not, and that the lesson really has been properly learned this time.