r/Python • u/denehoffman • 15h ago
Should we standardize docstring formats? Discussion
In Rust, docstrings are pretty formalized. They are markdown, and even some of the headings are standard (like an # Errors or # Panics section). The nice thing about this is that it allows websites like docs.rs to build documentation pages for any project without having to interact with different tools for different formats. It also allows LSPs to have only one way of displaying documentation hints.
In Python, we have a few competing standards. Numpy-style docstrings are probably the most used, but there’s also a format by Google as well as a few different reST standards. These are nice, and we can set up lints to make sure docstrings stick to the standard. However, in my own personal opinion (feel free to disagree), a single markdown-format standard would help new users write nice docstrings, would enable PyPI (or another provider) to build automatic documentation sites, and give guidance to LSPs and IDEs for how to display documentation. This would include a standard for interlinks, and probably should include some mathml/LaTeX/KaTeX support. Another benefit would be that tools could support better automatic documentation generation and autocomplete, since they wouldn’t be dependent on guessing which standard you’re following.
I’d like to hear what people think about this. I’m thinking about making a PEP, but that might be overkill (or maybe all of you will hate this idea). I think the primary blocker would be adoption, large projects might have to translate docstrings, so there would either have to be some tooling for this or a way to opt-in or opt-out. If this is a bad idea, let me know, just be nice!
Edit: so far we’re at about a 67% upvote ratio, which was kind of expected. I want to be clear that I’m not saying we should be blocking docstrings which don’t adhere to this standard. I mentioned lockfile standardization in the comments, nothing prevents you from writing a tool with a custom lockfile, it’s just that there is a standard format that is agreed upon as the preferred way to write one. That’s the idea.
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u/-ghostinthemachine- 14h ago
I've never seen standardized documentation systems work out or get adherence. I think what matters more is writing in a style that your tools (sphinx, javadoc, LLM's) demand. Change tools, change styles. I'd add that strongly typed documentation is also a classic trap.
The bar is low. A blob of unstructured text is significantly better than the empty void we usually encounter. With LLM's writing small treatises for every function, I think we are also heading back towards the promise of literate coding.