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HomeHomeOur CommunityOur CommunityGeneral Discuss...General Discuss...XML Comments in DNN Source For Intellisense SupportXML Comments in DNN Source For Intellisense Support
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7/25/2007 12:26 PM
 

In looking though the DNN core code I find that the use of XML comments on method headings is very limited.  If these were used it could make the API much eaiser for developers that are unfamiliar with the structures to know what each method does as it will be integrated into intellisense.

Is there any chance that this is something that will be addressed by the core team?  Is there enough capacity given the current core team members, workload, etc...?

I am even willing to help get this documentation into the code if that is an option as well.


-Mitchel Sellers
Microsoft MVP, ASPInsider, DNN MVP
CEO/Director of Development - IowaComputerGurus Inc.
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Visit mitchelsellers.com for my mostly DNN Blog and support forum.

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7/25/2007 1:23 PM
 

Mitchel,

I agree with you, every public property and method should be documented in the XML comments for Object Browser documentation. I think that there wasn't a huge effort in this area previously because those comments were not supported in VB, only in C#, showing up in the Object Browser.

The "feature" being supported in VB.Net is new to VS2005 I believe.

 
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7/25/2007 2:15 PM
 

Ed,

You are correct the support of XML for intellisense is something that is new to .NET 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005.

Core team, Scott, Shawn - any comments/insight/hope?


-Mitchel Sellers
Microsoft MVP, ASPInsider, DNN MVP
CEO/Director of Development - IowaComputerGurus Inc.
LinkedIn Profile

Visit mitchelsellers.com for my mostly DNN Blog and support forum.

Visit IowaComputerGurus.com for free DNN Modules, DNN Performance Tips, DNN Consulting Quotes, and DNN Technical Support Services
 
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7/25/2007 3:16 PM
 

Since I was on the core team during the time these were started I'll comment briefly about them.  Mark Hoskins tried to champion it early in the DNN 2.x series,  the process and templates for it were never really completed or demoed so the idea had legs but little action.  Then Charles Nurse did almost all of it that was present (In fact, as I recall, this may have been the first thing he worked on when he joined the team).  We were even able to use VBCommenter and NDoc to get a documented "API" out of it in the .Net 1.x days.  One problem was, IMHO,  that there was some debate over how much API to really "define" and make "official" if you will due to the chance for what would then definitely become breaking changes. (i.e. The more that is officially documented, the more that it subject to breaking when you change it).  Then of course there was the effort in actually going back in and actually doing the work of commenting it fully.  Charles put in basic comments to suit the most basic of needs and described the most important areas as he was working through his assigned Items and tasks.  Others followed suit as new areas were touched they usually got similar "basic" treatment.  So thus it exists.

If someone were to submit more "complete" comments I seriously doubt they would be rejected, I would guess that it just hasn't been made a priority to make the comments more exhaustive.


Jeremy White
DNN Core Team Alumni
 
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7/25/2007 3:48 PM
 

JWhite wrote

Since I was on the core team during the time these were started I'll comment briefly about them.  Mark Hoskins tried to champion it early in the DNN 2.x series,  the process and templates for it were never really completed or demoed so the idea had legs but little action.  Then Charles Nurse did almost all of it that was present (In fact, as I recall, this may have been the first thing he worked on when he joined the team).  We were even able to use VBCommenter and NDoc to get a documented "API" out of it in the .Net 1.x days.  One problem was, IMHO,  that there was some debate over how much API to really "define" and make "official" if you will due to the chance for what would then definitely become breaking changes. (i.e. The more that is officially documented, the more that it subject to breaking when you change it).  Then of course there was the effort in actually going back in and actually doing the work of commenting it fully.  Charles put in basic comments to suit the most basic of needs and described the most important areas as he was working through his assigned Items and tasks.  Others followed suit as new areas were touched they usually got similar "basic" treatment.  So thus it exists.

If someone were to submit more "complete" comments I seriously doubt they would be rejected, I would guess that it just hasn't been made a priority to make the comments more exhaustive.

I guess I can see this point a bit, but really if the framework is published, breaking changes will occur, regardless if they are documented or not.  I find that they will mark obsolete items in the framework, but it is just the overall comment tags defining general form/function of the methods that I see as the major lacking components.

With the migration to .NET 2.0 there is already a standard format for these types of comments as they are automatically inserted by Visual Studio if you type three ' charaxters.

I would love to see a newly created MSDN style documentation package, I have the tools to generate the package from the commented code I just want to see what the current core teams thoughts are on the matter before I try to do anything about it..as I don't really know the procedure to even go about providng this type of documentation since I am not part of the core team.


-Mitchel Sellers
Microsoft MVP, ASPInsider, DNN MVP
CEO/Director of Development - IowaComputerGurus Inc.
LinkedIn Profile

Visit mitchelsellers.com for my mostly DNN Blog and support forum.

Visit IowaComputerGurus.com for free DNN Modules, DNN Performance Tips, DNN Consulting Quotes, and DNN Technical Support Services
 
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