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  • situated docs
  • it's a 2 words compound
  • docs stands for documentation
  • user manual
  • instructions
  • guidelines
  • tutorial
  • the documentation of coding related practices
  • software documentation
  • instruction on how to use and make software
  • how to be a developer™
  • or how to do things with code without being a developer™
  • that is actually the case for most of the people that enjoy coding
  • or a way to enjoy coding more
  • situated refer to the context of this research
  • fine tuning about
  • kind
  • size
  • of software to look into
  • situated software
  • software built around the needs of a community
  • example xpub has a small server
  • server = a machine connected to the www
  • the soupboat
  • url hub.xpub.nl/soupboat
  • it is a shared space online
  • where we can prototype websites, hosting applications, etc
  • a place to call home in the internet
  • very public yet very intimate
  • ??
  • how to share knowledge about
  • how to run
  • how to manage
  • how to configure
  • our server
  • could this knowledge be useful for others than us
  • could this small system support others similar ones
  • how situated knowledges inform the knowledge surrounding our tools
  • how different situations generate different documentations
  • and how different contexts resonate together

  • a list
  • to explore the process of sharing knowledge and making worlds together around situated software
  • the plan
  • compile a list of
  • devices
  • thoughts
  • tools
  • references
  • hints
  • fieldwork
  • excercise
  • to articulate software documentation as a form of care
  • a list
  • that does not claim to catch everything
  • where order matters
  • but the relations between items matter more
  • a space to define outlines
  • sketch contours
  • and them draw through
  • a soft structure
  • a way to preserve the reality of each item
  • respect the origin of every source
  • without worries of tangling them together
  • the idea for this pubblication is to experiment with the list
  • as a writing machine
  • that seems already fun
  • here some prompts:

  • a spiral
  • the making of software as a ꩜
  • source code is at the center of the ꩜
  • with all the other actors ꩜ing around
  • one can get into the making of software from a distance
  • size of the ꩜ is related to
  • the distance from the source code
  • documentation is following the ꩜
  • distance from the center is related to specificity
  • more distant
  • less technical
  • similar to
  • gravitational approach
  • source code as a planet
  • with satellites
  • and orbits
  • documentation framework
  • excercise try to map a documentation framework on the ꩜
  • swirling from the outside
  • tutorials
  • learning oriented
  • basic competence
  • familiarize with the documentation
  • lesson
  • ꩜ing toward
  • how-to
  • goal oriented
  • series of steps to make something
  • like recipes
  • explanation
  • understanding oriented
  • discussion
  • how does it work
  • why it works like this
  • inner whirls
  • reference
  • information oriented
  • dry
  • technical description
  • a list
  • to consult
  • not to read
  • center of the ꩜
  • source code
  • but
  • this is just one version of it
  • could it be different?
  • what happen if we put the person at the center
  • if we put the code on the edges
  • or along the ꩜

  • LAMP
  • software is a lamp
  • documentation is the light
  • you can see the lamp if the light is lit
  • if it's not lit the lamp is there but you cannot see
  • can you use other lights to see the lamp ?
  • every lamp has its own light
  • which
  • kind of light
  • lamp you bring for camping
  • lamp you put near the bed

  • reference
  • Situated Software, Clay Shirky
  • Situated Knowledges, Donna Harawai
  • List and complexity: Annemarie Mol & John Law
  • Diataxis Documentation Framework, Daniele Procida

  • tanuki
  • the spirit animal of the developer is the tanuki
  • like racoons they collect resources from the internet
  • they patch together an answer from stack overflow and one from git

  • river
  • how to navigate the river of softwaru
  • how to structure the thesis writing machine ?
  • Which level of granularity ?
  • I would like to work with small text files
  • but then the parsing could be trublesome ?
  • small frontmatter files ?
  • every entry of the list is a different file ?
  • that is crazy, it would be much better to work with a DB
  • but the db is obscure and requires CRUD
  • that is not a problem...
  • but i would prefer to have the files with the text thereeee
  • writing the thesis in git
  • git writing workflow
  • wait also true that the thesis and the project are two different things
  • but still
  • everything is a file?