gabriellaah / synproject

SynProject Documentation Tool

SynProject

Synopse SynProject is an open source application for code source versioning and automated documentation of Delphi projects.

Licensed under a GPL license.

Take a look at the SynProject official web site

Features

Its main features are:

1. Local source code versioning;
2. Automated documentation.

Source code versioning

• handle multiple projects or libraries with the same program;
• allow source code versioning with detailed commits;
• can access to a PVCS tracker (more trackers are coming) and link the commits to the tickets;
• allow automated source code backup (without any commit to document: it's like a daily snapshot of your files);
• backups can be local (on your hard drive) or remote (on a distant drive);
• you can make a visual "diff" and compare source code versions side by side in the graphical user interface;
• you can see pictures (png jpeg bitmap icon) within the main user interface;
• diff storage between version is very optimized, and use little disk space;
• storage is based on .zip files and plain text files, so it's easy to work with.

Automated Documentation

• follow a typical Design Inputs -> Risk Assessment -> Software Architecture -> Detailed Design -> Tests protocols -> Traceability matrix -> Release Notes workflow;
• initial (marketing-level) Design Input can be refined into more precise Software Requirement Specifications;
• Design Inputs can evolve during the project life: all documentation stay synchronized and you will have to maintain the DI and their description only at one place;
• therefore, the process is meant to be compliant with the most precise documentation protocols (like IEC 62304); only one text file, formated like a wiki, contains the whole documentation;
• it's very easy to add pictures, or formated source code (pascal, C, C++, C#, plain text) into the documentation;
• word files (and then pdf) are created from this content, with full table of contents, picture or source code reference tables, unified page layout, customizable templates;
• it's easy to add tables to your document, or link to other part or external resources * you can even put pure RTF content into your documentation;
• pictures are centralized and captioned, people involved in the documentation are maintained once for the whole documentation;
• document version numbering and cross-referencing is handled easily;
• for pascal projects, the source code is parsed and all interface architecture is generated from the source; it's easy to browse classes, variables and functions from the documentation, and add reference to them to your document; the source code description can also be located in an external .sae file, therefore your original source code tree won't necessary be changed by the adding of comments;
• all references are cross-linked: Software Architecture Document is created from the source code, and also is able to highlight the classes or methods - involved in implementing every Design Input, from the Software Design Document;
• integrated GraphViz component, in order to create easily diagrams from plain text embedded into your documentation; * integrated fully featured text editor, with word wrapping, wiki-syntax buttons and keyboard shortcuts, and spell checking;
• a step by step Wizard is available to create a new project, from supplied template files; another Wizard is already available, to browse your documentation workflow, and check its consistency or set up its parameters;
• the documentation is integrated to the Versioning system above.

Of course, it's a full Open Source - GPL licensed - project. Source code (for Delphi 6/7) is available and maintained, since it is used by our internal projects (including our little mORMot).