Looking for a set of free software documentation templates? We have released 14 template files of typical documentation types to the public.
They are written in English and in MarkDown format. The license is CC0-1.0 and you can use them for your private, open source or commercial projects to document your software and web application.
What documentation types are available?
The following types of software documentation are currently implemented:
- Explanation
- Faq
- Glossary
- How To
- Installation Guide
- Knowledge Base
- Onboarding Guide
- Operating Manual
- Product Feature
- Reference – also available as reference document example with free Word template
- Release Notes
- Troubleshooting Guide
- Tutorial
- User Manual
Why are they provided for free?
Many software developers and companies do not have time or energy to create user documentation. So creating something from scratch or copying from somebody else is a viable solution.
Our goal is to provide solutions in form of information, templates, knowledge and tools for software documentation.
Creating good user documentation is not easy. So we would like to support and start an open platform to create, improve and share useful templates.
What can I do with the free templates?
Licensed under CC0 means, you can use them for any types of products and projects:
The Creative Commons CC0 Public Domain Dedication waives copyright interest in a work you’ve created and dedicates it to the world-wide public domain. Use CC0 to opt out of copyright entirely and ensure your work has the widest reach. As with the Unlicense and typical software licenses, CC0 disclaims warranties. CC0 is very similar to the Unlicense.
The files are in MarkDown format. This is a simple, text-based file format understood by most current documentation systems.
If you are using github for hosting your software projects, you can find more information on the following links
- https://docs.github.com/en/pages
- https://docs.github.com/en/github/writing-on-github/getting-started-with-writing-and-formatting-on-github/basic-writing-and-formatting-syntax
I found an error
The project is open and hosted on github. You can download, fork, watch, merge and improve the documentation templates. In case there is something you would like to change, please create an issue or even better fix it and create a pull request .
If you commit changes to the repository, please note the license of the project.
What are the next steps?
We would like to extend the existing templates, add more documentation types and add translations over time.
What documentation types are missing? Feel free to send us your feedback and suggestions.
Where can I download the free software documentation templates?
The first release contains 14 different software documentation templates.
To get updates about the templates, feel free to subscribe to our newsletter.