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51cea054a2
The stability index 3 (Locked) is unused and is being eliminated. Remove it from the documentation about the stability index. Remove mention of the Locked from CONTRIBUTING.md. The remaining text about the stability index is slight and not seemingly valuable. Removing it too. PR-URL: https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/11661 Ref: https://github.com/nodejs/node/issues/11200 Reviewed-By: Anna Henningsen <anna@addaleax.net> Reviewed-By: Sam Roberts <vieuxtech@gmail.com> Reviewed-By: Gibson Fahnestock <gibfahn@gmail.com> Reviewed-By: Michael Dawson <michael_dawson@ca.ibm.com> Reviewed-By: Michaël Zasso <targos@protonmail.com> Reviewed-By: Сковорода Никита Андреевич <chalkerx@gmail.com> Reviewed-By: James M Snell <jasnell@gmail.com>
86 lines
3.2 KiB
Markdown
86 lines
3.2 KiB
Markdown
# About this Documentation
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<!-- type=misc -->
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The goal of this documentation is to comprehensively explain the Node.js
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API, both from a reference as well as a conceptual point of view. Each
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section describes a built-in module or high-level concept.
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Where appropriate, property types, method arguments, and the arguments
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provided to event handlers are detailed in a list underneath the topic
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heading.
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Every `.html` document has a corresponding `.json` document presenting
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the same information in a structured manner. This feature is
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experimental, and added for the benefit of IDEs and other utilities that
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wish to do programmatic things with the documentation.
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Every `.html` and `.json` file is generated based on the corresponding
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`.md` file in the `doc/api/` folder in Node.js's source tree. The
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documentation is generated using the `tools/doc/generate.js` program.
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The HTML template is located at `doc/template.html`.
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If you find an error in this documentation, please [submit an issue][]
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or see [the contributing guide][] for directions on how to submit a patch.
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## Stability Index
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<!--type=misc-->
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Throughout the documentation, you will see indications of a section's
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stability. The Node.js API is still somewhat changing, and as it
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matures, certain parts are more reliable than others. Some are so
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proven, and so relied upon, that they are unlikely to ever change at
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all. Others are brand new and experimental, or known to be hazardous
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and in the process of being redesigned.
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The stability indices are as follows:
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```txt
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Stability: 0 - Deprecated
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This feature is known to be problematic, and changes are
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planned. Do not rely on it. Use of the feature may cause warnings. Backwards
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compatibility should not be expected.
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```
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```txt
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Stability: 1 - Experimental
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This feature is subject to change, and is gated by a command line flag.
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It may change or be removed in future versions.
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```
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```txt
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Stability: 2 - Stable
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The API has proven satisfactory. Compatibility with the npm ecosystem
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is a high priority, and will not be broken unless absolutely necessary.
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```
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## JSON Output
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> Stability: 1 - Experimental
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Every HTML file in the markdown has a corresponding JSON file with the
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same data.
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This feature was added in Node.js v0.6.12. It is experimental.
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## Syscalls and man pages
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System calls like open(2) and read(2) define the interface between user programs
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and the underlying operating system. Node functions which simply wrap a syscall,
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like `fs.open()`, will document that. The docs link to the corresponding man
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pages (short for manual pages) which describe how the syscalls work.
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**Caveat:** some syscalls, like lchown(2), are BSD-specific. That means, for
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example, that `fs.lchown()` only works on Mac OS X and other BSD-derived systems,
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and is not available on Linux.
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Most Unix syscalls have Windows equivalents, but behavior may differ on Windows
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relative to Linux and OS X. For an example of the subtle ways in which it's
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sometimes impossible to replace Unix syscall semantics on Windows, see [Node
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issue 4760](https://github.com/nodejs/node/issues/4760).
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[submit an issue]: https://github.com/nodejs/node/issues/new
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[the contributing guide]: https://github.com/nodejs/node/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md
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