The Art of Web Development Documentation: A Satirical Survival Guide

In the grand tradition of web development, where frameworks multiply faster than rabbits and JavaScript fatigue is a diagnosable condition, there exists a noble, oft-ignored pursuit: writing documentation. Legend has it that somewhere, in the deepest recesses of a codebase, lies a README file last updated during the reign of jQuery 1.x. Its wisdom? “TODO: Add docs.” Such is the sacred oath of the developer: ship first, document never.
 
Why document when your code is “self-explanatory”? After all, what could be clearer than a function named doThing() that accepts data, opts, and cb as parameters? Future you (or, more likely, some poor soul who inherits your project) will surely appreciate the archaeological thrill of deciphering your logic, hieroglyphics-style, while muttering ancient curses. Documentation, some say, is for the weak-real developers debug in production and communicate solely through cryptic commit messages.
 
But for those who dare to write documentation, best practices abound. Experts recommend writing clearly, avoiding jargon, and ensuring your docs are always up to date. Naturally, this means you’ll spend the first week of every sprint painstakingly updating your docs, only for the product manager to pivot the entire project on Friday afternoon. Outdated documentation is a rite of passage; it’s how you know your project is “agile”.
 
Of course, documentation is not just for onboarding new developers or appeasing auditors. No, it’s a tool for fostering collaboration, reducing technical debt, and ensuring that when your code inevitably breaks, at least someone can figure out why. Or so the theory goes. In practice, most developers treat documentation like IKEA instructions: only consulted after three failed attempts and a missing screw.
 
Should you inject humor into your docs? Some argue that a well-placed joke can make dense material more digestible, while others warn that humor is a slippery slope to chaos and unreadable puns. The real challenge, however, is resisting the urge to replace every section with “Here be dragons.” After all, documentation is serious business-unless it isn’t.
 
So next time you finish a feature, remember: code tells the computer what to do, but documentation tells the next developer why you did it that way. Or, if you’re feeling truly avant-garde, just leave a single line: “See Stack Overflow.” Future generations will thank you.