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Writing and publishing Docs on OpenLiberty.io

Overview

The Open Liberty website is built on the Antora framework, which provides a structure for publishing and managing versioned documentation. The documentation in the Open Liberty Docs section of the Open Liberty website defaults to the most recent release version. You can view previous release versions by selecting them from the version picker that precedes the sidebar navigation. Each release version is managed from a separate branch.

To write and publish content in Open Liberty Docs, you work with the following branches:

  • your personal branch

    For each new doc or edit to an existing doc, create a new branch based on the default vNext branch. Name this branch after the GitHub issue that tracks your work. Do all your writing and editing for that issue in this branch. When you're ready for the docs team to review your work, open a pull request from this branch to the draft branch. After your content publishes, delete this branch and start a new one for any new work. For more information, see Publishing a new topic and Updating an existing topic.

  • draft

    Deliver new content from your personal branch to draft so the Docs team can review it. All content updates stay in this branch until they're targeted to publish in the next release.

  • staging

    When content is approved for publication targeted for the next scheduled release, push it from your personal branch to the staging branch. The staging branch is the final opportunity to review the content and check that it’s ready to publish. Content stays in the staging branch only for the time it takes to verify it, after which a doc maintainer pushes the entire branch to vNext

  • vNext

    vNext is source of each upcoming release. At release time, a cut is taken from this branch to make the release branch, which is then named vX.0.0.x according to the release version.

The staging and vNext branches are protected and all pull requests to those branches require review from a either a doc member or doc maintainer. The Open Liberty docs are typically published every 4 weeks. If you want to publish doc updates with the next Open Liberty docs release, your doc updates must be merged to the vNext branch at least 3 business days before the Open Liberty docs release. For example, if the Open Liberty docs release is on Tuesday, , then you must complete your doc updates and merge them to the vNext branch by the previous Thursday. Only doc maintainers can merge pull requests to the vNext branch. The following sections provide further information about making doc updates and merging to the vNext branch.


Prior to publishing on the production site, Open Liberty content is reviewed on our draft and staging sites. We provide docs-only versions of both of these sites, which build faster than the full draft and staging sites, so that content updates are available for review sooner.

The following sites are available to review and publish docs content:

  • full draft site Contains all draft content (draft branches) of the site

  • docs-draft site Contains only the docs portion of the draft content (draft branch) of the site

  • full staging site Contains all staging content (staging branches) of the site

  • docs-staging site Contains only the docs portion of the staging content (staging branch) of the site

  • production site Contains all production content (prod branch) of the site

For a full breakdown of what branches and repos are used for each site, see the table breakdown.

Publishing a new topic

The author of the doc must complete the following steps:

  1. Clone the docs repo and create your feature branch off the default vNext branch. Include the number of the Git issue for the doc in the name of your branch (for example, 1234-concept-topic). Do all your writing and editing in this branch.

  2. Create your doc by using Asciidoc markup. Use an editor such as Atom or VSCode with the Asciidoc plug-in.

  3. When you finish the initial draft, check that it renders correctly by using the preview function in your editor. Make sure to run Acrolinx to check for grammar and IBM style issues.

  4. Push the file to GitHub, then create a pull request (PR) into the draft branch. Link the PR to the issue you created in Step 1. Request a review of the PR from David Mueller (dmuelle) or one of the doc members. Notify your reviewer that the doc is a new topic that needs to be added to the draft navigation. They can work with you to determine the best section of the navigation for your topic and to update the nav.adoc file.

  5. All the builds and deployments of non-prod sites have been moved to IBM Cloud and now build automatically whenever the a PR is merged into their respective branch. These builds are private and, therefore, their detailed build/deploy progress can't be tracked. However, if you have access to the Slack channel for draft site or the Slack channel for staging site, you can at least track when the builds start and finish.

  6. When the build is finished, check that the doc looks correct on either the docs-draft site or the full draft site.

    In addition to the existing full draft site we have a docs-draft site, which contains only the docs content, allowing it to build and deploy much quicker. However, since this site contains only the doc content, any links to other parts of openliberty.io will not resolve. In general, use the doc-draft site to review content because it updates much quicker than the full site. However, if you need to review content that links to pages on openliberty.io that are not in the docs, use the full draft site.

    If you see any problems, such as formatting issues or typos, resolve them first in your branch. Then, create another PR into draft branch, link the PR to the issue again, and get the PR merged. Wait for IBM Cloud to rebuild docs-draft site or full draft site and verify the change.

  7. Submit your doc for technical, strategist, peer, and editorial reviews.

    Reviewers can leave comments in the Git issue for the doc. Make sure to respond to their comments in the issue and document how you fixed the concerns that they raised. When the reviewer is satisfied with the draft, they can sign off by commenting their approval and adding the appropriate label to the Git issue:technical reviewed, peer reviewed, strategist reviewed, or editorial reviewed. Make sure to keep the Git Pipelines status updated in the issue to the stage of review that the doc is ready for or undergoing.

    If the doc is a task, it must be tested so that the steps are verified. Add the requires doc testing label to the issue. Coordinate testing with the technical reviewer and ask the tester to comment their approval in the issue and add the doc tested label after they verify the steps.

  8. When all the reviews are complete, if your doc is targeted to publish in the next release, create a PR from your branch (not from the draft branch) to the staging branch.

    If your doc isn’t targeted to publish until a later release, don’t make the PR to staging until the target release is the next scheduled release. For example, if your doc is targeted for the 20.0.0.10 release, don’t create a PR to staging until after the 20.0.0.9 release publishes.

    Link the PR to the issue. Request a review of the PR from David Mueller (dmuelle) or one of the doc maintainers. Work with your reviewer to update the staging nav.adoc file.

    In the PR, provide a link to your post on the full draft site or docs-draft site.

  9. If any changes are requested to the PR, make them in your branch and push them to draft branch first. Once the site rebuilds, check that everything is correct on the docs-draft site or full draft site.

  10. After the PR to staging is approved and merged, IBM Cloud automatically rebuilds the docs-staging site and full staging site. If you have access, you can track the progress in the Slack channel.

  11. When the build finishes, check to make sure the doc renders correctly on the docs-staging site or full staging site. If any changes are needed, make sure to add them to the draft branch and review on the full draft site or docs-draft site before you make a new PR to staging.

  12. After you verify the doc, post a link to it on one of the staging sites in the Git issue and change the issue status to Ready to publish. Open a PR from staging to vNext, add the issue number to the comment section of the PR (#issue_number), and request a review of the PR from David Mueller (dmuelle) or one of the doc maintainers. After the PR is approved and merged to vNext, the doc will publish with the next scheduled release.

Updating an existing topic

All edits and updates to existing Open Liberty Docs must be documented and tracked in a GitHub issue in the Open Liberty docs repo. To update an existing topic, complete the following steps:

  1. Clone the docs repo and create your feature branch off the default vNext branch. Include the number of the Git issue for the doc in the name of your branch (for example, 1234-concept-topic). Do all your writing and editing in this branch.

  2. Make the necessary edits to the doc or docs that are detailed in your GitHub issue. Check that the content looks right by using the preview function in your editor. Make sure to run Acrolinx to check for grammar and IBM style issues.

  3. Push the file to GitHub, then create a PR into the draft branch. Link the PR to the issue you created in Step 1. Request a review of the PR from David Mueller (dmuelle) or one of the doc members. Notify your reviewer if any changes to the navigation are required. They can work with you to update the nav.adoc file.

  4. After the PR is merged, wait for IBM Cloud to rebuild the docs-draft site or full draft site and verify the changes. If you have access to this Slack channel, you can use it to track build/deploy progress.

    If you see any problems, make any changes in your personal branch first, then push to the draft branch again and verify the changes after rebuild.

  5. Request a review of your doc

    If your changes just fix a typographical error or other minor grammar or style issues, request a peer review from a one of the doc members.

    If you make updates or additions to technical information, request a technical review from the appropriate SME. If you edit a task and the steps substantially change, the doc must be tested. Add the requires doc testing label to the issue. Coordinate testing with the technical reviewer and ask the tester to comment their approval in the issue and add the doc tested label when they verify the steps. After the technical review is complete, request a peer review from a one of the doc members.

    Reviewers can leave comments in the Git issue for the doc. Make sure to respond to their comments in the issue and document how you fixed the concerns that they raised. When the reviewer is satisfied with the draft, they can sign off by commenting their approval in the issue and adding the appropriate label to the Git issue:technical reviewed or peer reviewed. Make sure to keep the Git Pipelines status updated in the issue to the stage of review that the doc is ready for or undergoing.

  6. When all the reviews are complete, if your changes are targeted to publish in the next release, create a PR from your branch (not from the draft branch) to the staging branch. If your changes aren’t targeted to publish until a later release, don’t make the PR to staging until the target release is the next scheduled release. For example, if your update is targeted for the 20.0.0.10 release, don’t create a PR to staging until after the 20.0.0.9 release is published. Edits for grammar and style or for technical issues that aren’t connected to a specific release can be targeted to publish with the next scheduled release.

    Link the PR to the issue. Request a review of the PR from David Mueller (dmuelle) or one of the doc maintainers. Work with your reviewer to update the staging nav.adoc file.

    In the PR, provide a link to your update on the docs-draft site or full draft site.

  7. If any changes are requested to the PR, make them in your personal branch and push them to draft first. After the PR is merged, wait for IBM Cloud to rebuild the docs-draft site or full draft site and verify the changes. If you have access to this Slack channel, you can use it to track build/deploy progress.

  8. After the PR to staging is approved and merged, IBM Cloud will automatically rebuild the docs-staging site and full staging site. If you have access, you can track the progress in the Slack channel.

  9. When the build finishes, check to make sure the doc renders correctly on the docs-staging site or full staging site. If any changes are needed, make sure to add them to the draft branch and review on the full draft site or docs-draft site before you make a new PR to staging.

  10. After you verify the doc, post a link to it on one of the staging sites in the Git issue and change the issue status to Ready to publish. Open a PR from staging to vNext, add the issue number to the comment section of the PR (#issue_number), and Request a review of the PR from David Mueller (dmuelle) or one of the doc maintainers. After the PR is approved and merged to vNext, the changes publish with the next scheduled release.

Editing the Docs navigation

If you’re unsure of how to update the Open Liberty navigation or unfamiliar with the Antora navigation schema, work with a doc maintainer to plan and commit your update.

Site navigation in the Antora framework is controlled by a nav.adoc file. The Open Liberty Docs navigation is split between two nav.adoc files, one for the main Docs content and one for the reference topics. The content of each of these files is an unordered Asciidoc list, which determines the order and hierarchy of the navigation entries.

Since the Open Liberty draft, staging and production sites each maintain unique navigation files, you must update them individually, otherwise, unwanted changes and merge conflicts can occur.

The draft and staging branches each have a dedicated branch for editing the navigation. For the draft branch, this branch is called draft-nav and for the staging branch it’s called staging-nav. When you’re working in these branches, edit only the nav.adoc file and open pull requests only to the branch for which they are specified: draft for draft-nav and staging for staging-nav. The production navigation is automatically updated from vNext with each release. You should never directly update the nav.adoc file in the vNext branch. This file, along with everything else in vNext branch, is only updated through PRs from the staging branch.

To add an item to the navigation or to edit an existing item, complete the following steps:

  1. Pull down the draft-nav branch and open the nav.adoc file for the section of the navigation where you want you to add an entry.

    The nav.adoc file for the main Docs content is kept in the ROOT module and the nav.adoc file for the reference content is kept in the reference module.

  2. Add a properly formed Antora page reference to the section of the navigation list where you want your entry to appear. If you’re editing an existing item, make sure your changes use the proper syntax for an Antora page reference.

  3. Open a pull request from the draft-nav branch to the draft branch and request a review from a doc maintainer.

  4. After the PR is merged, wait for IBM Cloud to rebuild the docs-draft site or full draft site and verify the changes. If you have access to this Slack channel, you can use it to track build/deploy progress.

  5. After you review and verify your navigation updates on one of the draft sites, and if everything looks correct, create a PR to the staging branch.

    Don’t open a PR from draft-nav to staging. Since draft and staging have separate navigation files with different content, you must re-create your changes on the staging-nav branch and PR that branch to staging. Follow the same process that you used in steps 1 - 4, but instead of working in thedraft-nav and draft branches, make your changes in staging-nav and PR them to staging.

  6. After the PR to staging is reviewed, approved and merged, IBM Cloud will automatically rebuild the docs-staging site and full staging site. If you have access, you can track the progress in the Slack channel.

  7. After you verify your changes on docs-staging site or full staging site, ask a docs maintainer to open a PR from staging to vNext. Your updates can publish with the next scheduled release.