openchamber/packages/docs/CONTRIBUTING.md

Docs Authoring Guide

This package is docs content source-of-truth for OpenChamber.

Voice & style

Write for someone trying to get something done — not for an engineer reading a spec. Assume the reader may be non-technical. A page should feel quick to read, never like a separate chore just to get through one screen.

These rules describe how we already write the docs. Follow them so the style stays the same no matter who is writing.

Who you're writing for

• Assume curiosity, not expertise. The reader knows what they want to do, not how OpenChamber works inside.
• One page = one job. If a page is answering two unrelated questions, split it.

Keep it short

• Lead with the task, not background. The first line should say what the page is for ("Use openchamber tunnel to expose a running OpenChamber instance.").
• Cut anything that doesn't change what the reader does next.
• A basic page should fit in a screen or two. Long, dense reference pages (like Reverse Proxy) are the exception — and they say so in their first line ("Use this page if you run OpenChamber behind...").

Steps

• Number sequential actions; use bullets for options or unordered notes.
• Start each step with a verb: "Run", "Open", "Pick".
• End a procedure by telling the reader what success looks like, so they know they did it right.

3. Run `openchamber --ui-password be-creative-here`.
4. Open the printed URL (usually `http://localhost:3000`).

You should land on the OpenChamber session list. If you see it, the server is
running.

Plain language

• Explain a term the first time it appears, in parentheses, in everyday words:
  • good: start a tunnel (a public link to your local OpenChamber)
  • bad: start a tunnel — the reader doesn't know what that is yet
• Prefer common words over internal ones. "App", "version", "page" beat "surface", "instance", "route" when the meaning is the same. If an internal term is unavoidable, define it once.
• Don't reach for SSE, WebSocket, buffering, or header names unless the page is explicitly an advanced/operator page.

Bullets and sentences

• Be consistent within a single list. Either all short fragments (lowercase, no period) or all full sentences (capital letter, period) — don't mix the two in one list.
• Use fragments for quick option lists; use full sentences for rules, warnings, or anything the reader must not misread.

Link out instead of re-explaining

• Where a step can realistically fail, link to Troubleshooting right there, not only at the bottom.
• Don't re-document something another page owns — link to it. (Quickstart points at Install for the actual install command instead of copying it.)

Show, don't only tell

• A screenshot beats a paragraph for anything visual (where a button is, what a screen looks like). See Images for how to add one.
• Always pair a screenshot with one line of text — the image supports the step, it isn't the whole step.

Commands and code

• Make code blocks copy-paste-ready: real, working values. Only use a <placeholder> when the value is genuinely user-specific, and make that obvious (e.g. app.example.com, ~/.secrets/cf-token).
• One command per idea. Don't chain unrelated commands just to look compact.

Add a new docs page

1. Create a new file in packages/docs/content/docs/.

   • Example: packages/docs/content/docs/remote-access.mdx

2. Add frontmatter at top:

   ---
   title: Remote Access
   description: Access OpenChamber from outside your local network.
   ---
   

3. Use route-safe naming:

   • foo.mdx -> /foo/
   • folder/index.mdx -> /folder/
   • folder/bar.mdx -> /folder/bar/

4. Add translations for the page — see Localization. New pages must include translated files for every supported locale before they ship.

5. If the page is linked from the sidebar, add its localized labels too — see Translate the sidebar.

6. Run validation:

   bun run docs:validate
   

Add a new sidebar section

Edit packages/docs/sidebar.config.json.

Example:

{
  "label": "Advanced",
  "items": [{ "label": "Remote Access", "link": "/remote-access/" }]
}

Rules:

• use trailing slash in links (/page/)
• every sidebar link must map to an existing MDX file
• keep section labels short and task-oriented

Images

Images live inside the docs content tree so they sync to the website with the pages (the sync copies all of content/docs/, not just .mdx). Reference them with a relative path; Astro optimizes them at build time.

content/docs/
  install.mdx          ->  ![Desktop app](./images/desktop.png)
  images/
    desktop.png

Rules:

• co-locate images under content/docs/ (e.g. content/docs/images/); a relative ./images/... reference is resolved and optimized at build
• always set meaningful alt text (and translate it in localized pages)
• do not put docs images in the website repo's public/ — it is not the source of truth and the sync will not pick them up
• keep originals reasonably sized; the build generates responsive variants

For translations, reuse the same shared image when it carries no text. If a screenshot contains localized UI text, add a per-locale copy under that locale's folder (e.g. uk/images/...) and point the translated page at it.

docs:validate only checks .mdx, so images never block validation.

Light / dark variants

To show a different screenshot per theme, add a -light / -dark pair and tag each with oc-light-only / oc-dark-only. The website ships CSS for these classes (keyed on Starlight's data-theme), so the right one shows and follows the in-page theme toggle.

Use the <Image> component so the images stay optimized while taking a class. Add the imports right under the frontmatter:

---
title: Install
description: ...
---

import { Image } from "astro:assets";
import desktopLight from "./images/desktop-light.png";
import desktopDark from "./images/desktop-dark.png";

<Image src={desktopLight} alt="Desktop app" class="oc-light-only" />
<Image src={desktopDark} alt="Desktop app" class="oc-dark-only" />

Notes:

• both files live under content/docs/ like any other image and sync normally
• give both the same alt (and translate it in localized pages)
• if you only have one image, just use the normal ![alt](./path.png) form

Localization

The docs are translated into the same languages the OpenChamber app ships in. English is the source of truth and lives at the root of content/docs/. Every other language mirrors the English files under a locale folder.

Supported locales

Language	Content folder	Sidebar translations key
English	(root, no folder)	en
Ukrainian	uk/	uk
Chinese (Simplified)	zh-cn/	zh-CN
Spanish	es/	es
Brazilian Portuguese	pt-br/	pt-BR
Korean	ko/	ko
Polish	pl/	pl
French	fr/	fr
German	de/	de
Japanese	ja/	ja

Important

The content folder uses the lowercase locale key (zh-cn, pt-br); the sidebar translations key uses the BCP-47 language tag (zh-CN, pt-BR). They look similar but are not interchangeable — Starlight resolves them with different rules. Everything else (uk, es, ko, pl, fr, de, ja, en) is identical in both columns.

This locale set is mirrored in the website at openchamber-website/apps/docs/astro.config.mjs (locales). If a language is added or removed, update both places.

Translate a page

Mirror the English file under each locale folder, keeping the exact same filename and path. Starlight matches a translation to its English page by path.

content/docs/
  install.mdx              # English (source of truth)
  uk/install.mdx           # Ukrainian
  zh-cn/install.mdx        # Chinese (Simplified)
  es/install.mdx           # Spanish
  pt-br/install.mdx        # Brazilian Portuguese
  ko/install.mdx           # Korean
  pl/install.mdx           # Polish
  fr/install.mdx           # French
  ja/install.mdx           # Japanese

  guides/tunnels.mdx       # nested English page
  uk/guides/tunnels.mdx    # its Ukrainian translation

Each translated file needs its own translated frontmatter (title and description are required by validation):

---
title: Встановлення
description: Встановіть OpenChamber для десктопа, вебу або VS Code.
---

Every new page must include translated files for all supported locales before it ships. Starlight can fall back to English when a translation is missing, but do not rely on that fallback for new docs pages.

Translate the sidebar

Do not create separate sidebar entries per language and do not add a locale prefix to link — Starlight prefixes the active locale automatically. Instead, add a translations map (keyed by the BCP-47 tag from the table above) to each section and item in sidebar.config.json:

{
  "label": "Start here",
  "translations": {
    "uk": "Почніть тут",
    "zh-CN": "从这里开始",
    "es": "Empieza aquí",
    "pt-BR": "Comece aqui",
    "ko": "여기서 시작",
    "pl": "Zacznij tutaj",
    "fr": "Commencer ici",
    "de": "Hier starten",
    "ja": "ここから開始"
  },
  "items": [
    {
      "label": "Install",
      "link": "/install/",
      "translations": {
        "uk": "Встановлення",
        "zh-CN": "安装",
        "es": "Instalación",
        "pt-BR": "Instalação",
        "ko": "설치",
        "pl": "Instalacja",
        "fr": "Installation",
        "de": "Installation",
        "ja": "インストール"
      }
    }
  ]
}

A label with no translation for the active locale falls back to the English label.

What not to translate

• brand and product nouns: OpenChamber, OpenCode, VS Code, PWA, GitHub, Discord, macOS, SSH
• code blocks, shell commands, file paths, flags, and config keys
• the page filename and the sidebar link (these stay identical across locales)

Validate

bun run docs:validate walks every .mdx under content/docs/ — including translations — and fails if any page is missing title or description frontmatter, or if a sidebar link does not resolve to an English page. Run it after adding or translating pages.

Sync into openchamber-website

openchamber-website renders/deploys docs via Starlight in apps/docs.

After docs content updates here:

1. copy packages/docs/content/docs/* -> openchamber-website/apps/docs/src/content/docs/* (this is recursive, so locale folders like uk/ and zh-cn/ carry over with no extra steps)
2. map packages/docs/sidebar.config.json into openchamber-website/apps/docs/astro.config.mjs sidebar (the translations maps carry over as-is)
3. run docs checks/build in website repo

Automation support exists in .github/workflows/docs-source.yml (release/manual packaging of docs source artifact).