[Python-Dev] Allow use of sphinx-autodoc in the standard library documentation?

Thu May 10 07:02:20 CEST 2012

One of the requirements for acceptance of PEP 3144 if the provision of
a reStructuredText API reference.
The current plan for dealing with that is to use Spinx apidoc to
create a skeleton, and then capture the rewritten ReST produced by
autodoc.
However, it occurs to me that the module reference could actually
*use* autodoc, with additional prose added to supplement the
docstrings, rather than completely replacing them.
I'd initially dismissed this idea out of hand, but recently realised I
didn't have any especially strong arguments against it (and there are
all the usual "avoid double-keying data" arguments in favour).
So, given the advantages of autodoc, is there a concrete reason why we
can't use it for the documentation of *new* standard library modules?
Regards,
Nick.
-- 
Nick Coghlan   |   ncoghlan at gmail.com   |   Brisbane, Australia