My take after running engineering teams at multiple companies: documentation survives when it lives next to the code. File-level header comments explaining each component's purpose and role in the architecture. A good README tying it all together. If you compartmentalize architecture into folders, a README per folder. This works for humans, LLMs, and GitHub search alike. ADRs, Notion docs, and Confluence pages die be…
> documentation survives when it lives next to the code. 15+ years ago, this was pretty much the standard. Every decision - whether major or just a hack to handle a corner-case - used to be recorded in the code itself. Then tools like Jira and Confluence came in and these things moved to undiscoverable nooks and corners of the organization. AI search tools like Glean and Rovo have improved the discoverability, though…
Re: How do you capture WHY engineering decisions were made, not just what?
#71Agree!