documentation_guide

Guide to good documentation practices, as described in Effective Computation in Physics (O'Reilly).

What to include?
-Equations implemented
-Links to journal articles of influence
-Thought process
-What would be recorded in a lab notebook

Types of Documentation:
Theory manuals, user and developer guides, code comments, self-documenting code, generated API documentation

	Theory Manuals
	-Captures the scientific goals and provenance of the code
	-Peer-reviewed
	-Archived
	-Can be cited
	
	......

	User and Developer Guides
		Readme Files
		-Include basic information on: installation, citation, license, release, about
		EXAMPLE:
			SQUIRREL, version 1.2 released on 2026-09-20
	
			# About

			The Spectral Q and U Imaging Radiation Replicating Experimental Library (SQUIRREL) is a library for replication radiation sources with spectral details and Q and U polarization of superman bubblehum.

			# Installation

			The SQUIRREL library relies on other libraries:

			- The ACORN library www.acorn.nutz
			- The TREEBRANCH database format API

			Install those before installing the SQUIRREL library. To install the SQUIRRel library:
			./configure
			make --prefix=/install/path
			make install

			...

	Comments
	-In Python, you can use pound sign (#) or triple quote (""") to denote a comment