Microsoft Docs

Microsoft Docs is the library of technical documentation for end users, developers, and IT professionals who work with Microsoft products. Microsoft Docs website provides technical specifications, conceptual articles, tutorials, guides, API references, code samples and other information related to Microsoft software and web services. Microsoft Docs was introduced in 2016 as a replacement of MSDN and TechNet libraries which previously hosted some of these materials.[1][2]

This article is about Microsoft technical documentation library. For the discontinued Microsoft Office document sharing service, see Docs.com.
Microsoft Docs
Type of site
Knowledge base
Available inMultiple languages
OwnerMicrosoft
URLdocs.microsoft.com
CommercialYes
RegistrationOptional
LaunchedJune 2016 (2016-06)
Current statusOnline

Structure and features

The content on Microsoft Docs is organised into groups based on product or technology and steps of working with it: evaluating, getting started, planning, deploying, managing, and troubleshooting. Navigation panel and product/service pages show material breakdown according to these principle. Each article displays its estimated reading time. There's a function to download specific docs section as a PDF file for offline use.

Website has responsive layout so it is designed to work on mobile devices and tablets.

Most documentation content is open-sourced and accepts pull requests. Each article is represented as a Markdown file in various GitHub repositories. Microsoft released a set of Visual Studio Code extensions, Docs Authoring Pack, to assist in editing Microsoft Docs content. It includes the support of Docs-specific markdown features.[3][4]

History

Microsoft Docs preview was introduced in June 2016, initially containing .NET documentation.[4] The process of migrating the bulk of MSDN and TechNet libraries' content have taken approximately two years. Key events:

  • November 2016: the documentation for Azure, Visual Studio 2017 RC, C++, ASP.NET Core, Entity Framework Core and SQL on Linux was added.[5]
  • September 2017: the documentation for Office SharePoint, Windows 10, Windows Server 2016, and BizTalk Server ITPro was migrated from MSDN/TechNet.[6]
  • February 2018: Microsoft added new feedback system for Docs based on GitHub issues.[7]
  • September 2018: Microsoft Learn was launched on Microsoft Docs.[8]
  • November 2018: OneDrive technical documentation moved from TechNet to Microsoft Docs.[9]

See also

References
  1. Mark J. Price: C# 7 and .NET Core: Modern Cross-Platform Development Packt Publishing Ltd, 2017, p. 126
  2. Jonathan Allen. MSDN/TechNet Being Replaced by Open Source Project docs.microsoft.com InfoQ News
  3. Sergio Govoni. Microsoft Docs and Localization Community Platform
  4. "Introducing Microsoft Docs". Microsoft.
  5. "Microsoft Docs November Update". Microsoft.
  6. "Microsoft Docs September 2017 release notes". Microsoft.
  7. "A New Feedback System Is Coming to docs.microsoft.com". Microsoft.
  8. "Introducing Microsoft.com/Learn". Microsoft.
  9. João Carrasqueira. Microsoft is moving its OneDrive technical documentation to Microsoft Docs Neowin News
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