:orphan:

.. _style-guide:

==============================
Writing Bugzilla Documentation
==============================

The Bugzilla documentation uses
`reStructured Text (reST) <http://docutils.sourceforge.net/rst.html>`_,
as extended by our documentation compilation tool,
`Sphinx <http://sphinx-doc.org/>`_. This document is a reST document for
demonstration purposes. To learn from it, you need to read it in reST form.

When you build the docs, this document gets built (at least in
the HTML version) as a standalone file, although it isn't as useful in that
form because some of the directives discussed are invisible or change when
rendered.

`The Sphinx documentation <http://sphinx-doc.org/latest/rest.html>`_
gives a good introduction to reST and the Sphinx-specific extensions. Reading
that one immediately-linked page should be enough to get started. Later, the
`inline markup section <http://sphinx-doc.org/latest/markup/inline.html>`_
is worth a read.

Bugzilla's particular documentation conventions are as follows:

Block Directives
################

Chapter headings use the double-equals, page title headings the #, and then
the three other levels are headings within a page. Every heading should be
preceded by an anchor, with a globally-unique name with no spaces. Now, we
demonstrate the available heading levels we haven't used yet:

.. _uniqueanchorname:

Third Level Heading
===================

Fourth Level Heading
--------------------

Fifth Level Heading
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(Although try not to use headings as deep as the 5th level.)

Make links to anchors like this: :ref:`uniqueanchorname`. It'll pick up the
following heading name automatically and use it as the link text. Don't use
standard reST internal links like `uniqueanchorname`_ - they don't work
across files.

Comments are done like this:

.. This is a comment. It can go on to multiple lines. Follow-on lines need to
   be indented.

Other block types:

.. note:: This is just a note, for your information. Like all double-dot
   blocks, follow-on lines need to be indented.

.. warning:: This is a warning of a potential serious problem you should be
   aware of.

Use both of the above block types sparingly. Consider putting the information
in the main text, omitting it, or (if long) placing it in a subsidiary file.

.. todo:: This is some documentation-related task that still needs doing.
          This is useful for short-term todos during development; however,
          consider filing a bug for todos which will persist longer.

Code gets highlighted using Pygments. Choose the highlighter at the top of
each file using:

.. highlight:: console

You can change the highlighter for a particular block by introducing it like
this:

.. code-block:: perl

   # This is some Perl code
   print "Hello";

There is a
`list of all available lexer names <http://pygments.org/docs/lexers/>`_
available. We currently use ``console``, ``perl``, and ``sql``. ``none`` is
also a valid value.

Use 4-space indentation, except where a different value is better so that
things line up. So normally two spaces for bulleted lists, and 3 spaces
for .. blocks.

Inline Directives
#################

.. warning:: Remember that reST does not support nested inline markup. So you
   can't have a substitution inside a link, or bold inside italics.

* A filename or a path to a filename:
  :file:`/path/to/{variable-bit-of-path}/filename.ext`

* A command to type in the shell:
  :command:`command --arguments`

* A parameter name:
  :param:`shutdownhtml`

* A parameter value:
  :paramval:`DB`

* A group name:
  :group:`editbugs`

* A bug field name:
  :field:`Summary`

* Any string from the UI:
  :guilabel:`Administration`

* A specific BMO bug:
  :bug:`201069`