documentation-standards

Guidance for writing software documentation for different readers and needs. It includes the Diátaxis approach, which separates learning tutorials, task-based how-to guides, explanations, and technical reference material.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it when writing or improving API documentation, user guides, developer documentation, or documentation structure.
Why use it?
It helps you choose the right structure and level of detail instead of mixing instructions, background, and reference information together. This makes documentation easier to use and maintain.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Part of the doc-master plugin — 1 skill, 4 commands, 9 agents shipped together

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/hculap/better-code/documentation-standards
Any agent
npx skills add hculap/better-code --skill documentation-standards
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/hculap/better-code

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Or install doc-master, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 1 skill, 4 commands, 9 agents.

Per session 71 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,678 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00071 $0.01678
Opus 5 $0.00036 $0.00839
Sonnet 5 $0.00014 $0.00336
Haiku 4.5 $0.00007 $0.00168

Measured 2d ago against content hash 0e053d47825f, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

documentation-standards scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

plugins/doc-master/skills/documentation-standards/SKILL.md · 250 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 250 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Documentation Standards

Comprehensive guidance for creating bulletproof software documentation using industry-proven frameworks and quality standards.

Overview

Effective documentation requires structure, consistency, and audience awareness. This skill provides frameworks and quality criteria for creating documentation that serves developers, users, and stakeholders across all software project domains.

Supported Frameworks

Diátaxis Framework (Recommended)

The Diátaxis framework organizes documentation into four distinct types based on user needs:

Type Orientation Purpose User State
Tutorials Learning Teach through doing "I want to learn"
How-to Guides Tasks Solve specific problems "I want to accomplish X"
Explanations Understanding Provide context and background "I want to understand why"
Reference Information Describe the machinery "I need technical details"

When to use Diátaxis:

  • Products with diverse user bases (beginners to experts)
  • Growing documentation that needs scalable structure
  • Teams wanting clear content ownership
  • Projects requiring both learning paths and quick lookups

For detailed Diátaxis implementation, consult references/diataxis.md.

Traditional Structure

A straightforward hierarchical approach suitable for smaller projects:

Section Purpose
Overview High-level project description and goals
Getting Started Quick setup and first steps
API Reference Technical specifications and endpoints
Examples Code samples and use cases
FAQ Common questions and troubleshooting

When to use Traditional:

  • Developer tools and API-first projects
  • Smaller codebases with focused scope
  • Teams preferring linear documentation flow
  • Projects with primarily technical audiences

For detailed Traditional structure guidance, consult references/traditional.md.

Read the full file on GitHub · 250 lines

Files

What ships with it

7 files beside SKILL.md in the same directory: the scripts, references and assets a skill reads on demand. Not counted in the per-session cost; read them before you install if any of them is executable.

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 250 lines · 71 tokens per session scan A 0e053d47825f

Subscribe to this mod's changes

documentation-standards is a skill published in the GitHub repository hculap/better-code (2 stars, last pushed 7mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 71 tokens to every session and 1,678 once invoked, about $0.0004 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-31.