Re: The standard library is better documented

From: Andrey Semashev (andrey.semashev_at_[hidden])
Date: 2023-12-02 16:21:10

On 12/2/23 03:35, Niilo Huovila via Boost wrote:
> By better I mean cppreference.com. There's a page for pretty much
> everything in the standard library. Related pages are linked. The
> preconditions and behavior of functions are specified. Consequentially I
> come to Boost only when the standard library doesn't do enough. If you
> are going to compete with the standard library instead of just
> supplementing it, you need outstanding documentation.

To be fair, as useful as cppreference.com is, it is not quite the same
kind of documentation as Boost documentation is. It is mostly similar to
the reference section that you can find in most libraries' docs, as it
basically translates the standard wording to human language and gives a
single usage example in the end. There is no rationale, discussion, or
usage recommendations.

The unquestionable advantage of cppreference.com is that it has lots of
cross-links, which makes it very easy to navigate and find what you're
looking for. Cross-linking is definitely something that Boost docs could
use more.