Highlights:

  • Tool streamlines documentation, providing technical writers with developer tools like Git, build pipelines, and automated checks.
  • The tool permits the use of Markdown and semantic XML-based markup and the capability to seamlessly blend the two for enhanced extensibility.

Recently, Writerside, an authoring and publishing solution for technical documentation, was launched in early access by JetBrains, which creates software for project management and integrated development environments for various programming languages.

Developers spend a lot of time writing code and creating new products, services, and technologies. Still, once they’re done, all of that code needs to be maintained, which entails describing functionality and operation.

Indeed, this involves adhering to best practices in code writing, including in-line comments, as well as collaborating with technical writers who create comprehensive product documentation, API references, tutorials, developer guides, and how-tos to support future developers in utilizing the code or tools.

With Writerside, the capacity to create these documents is seamlessly integrated into the JetBrains IDE, where developers author their code, and is also available as a standalone tool. This integration streamlines the documentation process throughout its lifecycle, empowering technical writers to access the same developer-centric tools, including Git, build pipelines, and automated checks.

Product Lead, Anna Gasparyan said, “With Writerside, we want to empower writers with the tools that developers have long been using. Unfortunately, documentation is still often overlooked, and technical writers don’t get the acknowledgment or the support they deserve.”

The documentation can make or break the adoption of a product, which is crucial to developer productivity and customer satisfaction. Easy-to-read documentation increases developers’ productivity by almost 50%, according to a GitHub report from 2022. Gasparyan said, “Our mission is to bridge the gap between developers and writers and make documentation a team sport.”

The tool supports using Markdown and semantic XML-based markup and combining the two to make Writerside documents as extensible as possible. As a result, the elements are able to search for and retrieve links to functions and code, allowing them to jump back to API references and document sections.

Even smaller chunks of content or entire sections can be reused. A section may be configured to update only once and change everywhere or only when a predetermined condition is met.

Writerside can check automatically for broken links, missing resources, incorrect attributes, and more, thanks to more than 100 different built-in tests. Before the document is published, writers can check it against the company style guide or other branding elements to ensure consistency throughout the entire property.

Without waiting for a render, authors will be able to see documents exactly as readers see them, including in custom styles. A preview function will also highlight any potential errors, making testing simpler. This also applies to complete website structures, enabling the identification of navigation errors and accessible within the web browser.

Customization options for users who want to personalize their Writerside experience include light and dark mode, contract, soft, or vivid skins. Businesses can customize the output to align with their corporate design, allowing writers to focus on document creation without concerns about styles, formatting, or CSS.

To help writers stay in the flow of writing, Writerside also has its own artificial intelligence-based spellchecker and grammar checker tool from JetBrains. More than 25 languages are currently supported, including English, German, Spanish, and Chinese.

Writerside is currently available in early-access mode, serving as a plugin for JetBrains IDEs and as a standalone application, offering writers professional authoring capabilities.