WebPlatform.org: a growing web development documentation project

Ryan Boudreaux reviews the current offerings and content of the WebPlatform.org collaboration project.

WebPlatform.org is a resource for current, cross-browser, cross-platform, and cross-device documentation for best coding practices. Contributors to WebPlatform.org include these stewards: the W3C, Adobe, Facebook, Google, HP, Intel, Microsoft, Mozilla, Nokia, and Opera Software.

In October 2012, I wrote about how to contribute to the then new WebPlatform.org project. I decided to check in on the project and see what advancements have been made in the past 12 months.

Documentation

The community-driven Web Platform Docs is well on its way to becoming a comprehensive and authoritative source for web developer documentation. The documentation has grown significantly since my first review of the project. The Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) collection is one example of a topic whose index of articles has flourished and currently lists 115 subjects on the subject.

The documentation is divided into nine categories.

1. Beginner's guide includes introductory content featuring web fundamentals such as The history of the Web, structuring your content (i.e., HTML structural elements), styling your content (i.e., Targeting styles with media queries), and adding dynamic behavior using JavaScript (i.e., Manipulating CSS with JavaScript).
2. General web concepts is a collection of eight general web development subjects and tutorial articles. Some of the topics include Internet and Web, General programming, and Mobile Web.
3. HTML includes conceptual, tutorial, and reference materials for the main markup language of the web with six topics: tutorials, element reference, attribute reference, API reference, data type reference, and entity reference.
4. CSS is the conceptual, tutorial, and reference materials for Cascading style sheets (CSS) and includes six topics: CSS learning material, CSS selectors, CSS properties, CSS functions, atrules, and media queries.
5. Accessibility reviews patterns, practices, and business cases for making the web work for people with a diverse range of abilities. It includes a section on accessibility and the mobile web and a list of external references.
6. JavaScript provides tutorial and reference materials for JavaScript; it also includes reference materials for third-party JavaScript libraries. Topics include Functions, Objects, Events, and Regular expressions.
7. DOM offers tutorial and reference materials for the Document Object Model (DOM) events and methods. It also includes articles for subjects such as DOM learning material and Methods.
8. SVG presents tutorial and reference materials for the XML markup language that describes two-dimensional vector graphics. Topics include tutorials, Elements, Attributes, and Methods, among others.
9. APIs provides reference materials for JavaScript APIs from appcache to xhr, though several of these materials require some review.

Collaboration and contributions

You can contribute to the documentation by becoming an editor. In order to become an editor, you must register first. Before you register, I recommend reading the Editor's Guide Overview.

WebPlatform.org also includes a discussion chat area, a blog, a community, and a project issues dashboard.

If you've contributed to or used WebPlatform.org, please share your impressions of the project.