ReStructuredText Style Guide

This page describes how reStructuredText (reST) is written for MSL documentation with examples. The last section documents our formatting conventions.

For more general guides to writing reStructuredText, see Sphinx’s reStructuredText Primer and the docutils Quick reStructuredText guide.

Inline Text Styling

Italics
*italic text* → italic text.
Bold
**bold text** → bold text.
Monospace
``monospace text`` → monospace text. When referring to code objects, it’s better to use markup that links to the object’s API documentation (see the Links to code objects section).
Inline math
:math:`\sqrt{16}` → \(\sqrt{16}\) (See also the Math section).

Note

Inline styles can’t be nested

For example, you can’t write *see :ref:`this page <label>`*.

Inline markup also needs to be surrounded by white space, though trailing punctuation is fine. You can get around this with an escaped space that is otherwise invisible, For example one\ *word* renders as oneword.

Other semantic markup

In addition to the fundamental inline typesetting styles above, you may use additional reST roles to provide semantic meaning to the text. The documentation’s CSS takes advantage of this semantic meaning to provide visual cues to readers.

Abbreviations
:abbr:`MSL (Multi-robot Systems Lab)` → MSL (a tool tip exposes the definition)
Filenames and paths
:file:`repos.yaml` → repos.yaml
Shell commands
:command:`git rebase -i master` → git rebase -i master
User interface labels
:guilabel:`New Pull Request` → New Pull Request. This markup can be used for button labels, menus, or even text labels in interactive shell programs.
Keyboard commands
:kbd:`Control-a s` → Control-a s. Spell out the keys rather than using Emacs short hand, such as C-x.

To semantically markup Python code objects, refer to the section on Links to code objects.

Lists

Unordered lists can be written as:

- First item

  Second paragraph for first item, needs to be consistently indented.
- Second item

- You can put spaces between items, or not.

- Hierarchical lists are also possible

  - Put a blank space before the sub-list
  - And indent the sub-list consistently

- Last item.

which renders as:

  • First item

    Second paragraph for first item, needs to be consistently indented.

  • Second item

  • You can put spaces between items, or not.

  • Hierarchical lists are also possible

    • Put a blank space before the sub-list
    • And indent the sub-list consistently

  • Last item.

There should be a blank line before and after the list to separate the list from paragraphs. Blanks lines are allowed between list items as well.

Enumerated lists can be written similarly:

1. First thing
2. Second thing

or automatically enumerated,

#. First thing
#. Second thing

which renders as:

  1. First thing
  2. Second thing

or automatically enumerated,

  1. First thing
  2. Second thing

Definition lists

Definition lists are terms with an indented content section. For example:

MSL
   Multi-robot Systems Lab

produces

MSL
Multi-robot Systems Lab

Definition lists are not limited to dictionary-like usage; they can be employed whenever a series of terms with associated micro content is needed.

Sections

We create section hierarchies as follows:

==========
Page Title
==========

First Section
=============

First Subsection
----------------

First Sub-subsection
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

First Sub-sub-subsection
""""""""""""""""""""""""

Second Section
==============

This specific sequence of section markup styles is not mandated by the reST specification, but we encourage you to use it for consistency across all reST documents.

Linking

Tables

We recommend that you use the ‘grid’ reST tables syntax for tables, since they are more flexible than ‘simple’ reST tables. And although not necessary, we suggest that you provide a caption using the table directive and a label prefixed with “table-.” For example:

.. _table-label:

.. table:: Table caption.

    +------------------------+------------+----------+----------+
    | Header row, column 1   | Header 2   | Header 3 | Header 4 |
    +========================+============+==========+==========+
    | body row 1, column 1   | column 2:  | column 3 | column 4 |
    |                        | one row on | spans    |          |
    |                        | many lines | both     |          |
    +------------------------+------------+ rows     +----------+
    | body row 2             | ...        |          | ...      |
    +------------------------+------------+----------+----------+

produces

Table caption.
Header row, column 1 Header 2 Header 3 Header 4
body row 1, column 1 column 2: one row on many lines column 3 spans both rows column 4
body row 2 … …

Note how cells can be joined by omitting the dividing line. The = characters divide the header from table content. Text in the header is set in bold.

You can write tables with multiple header rows, including spans across header cells:

.. _rst-table-multi-header-example:

.. table:: Table with two header rows, including a span.

   +-----------------------+
   | Header spans columns  |
   +-----------+-----------+
   | Col 1     | Col 2     |
   +===========+===========+
   | 0.0       | 0.21      |
   +-----------+-----------+
   | 0.0       | 2.34      |
   +-----------+-----------+

to get:

Table with two header rows, including a span.
Header spans columns
Col 1 Col 2
0.0 0.21
0.0 2.34

In the simplest cases, tables are not required to have headers, or even be inside a table directive.

+-----------+--------------+
| us-east-1 | ami-e2490b88 |
+-----------+--------------+
| us-west-2 | ami-9a0f1dfb |
+-----------+--------------+

produces:

us-east-1 ami-e2490b88
us-west-2 ami-9a0f1dfb

Be sure to leave a blank line before and after the table directive.

Images and Figures

Plain images

Plain images can be included with the image directive.

.. image:: /_static/images/logos/Logo-MSL.png
   :scale: 15 %
   :target: https://msl.stanford.edu
   :alt: Multi-robot Systems Lab Logo
Multi-robot Systems Lab Logo

This example shows how an image can by hyperlinked to any URL with the target field. Internal links, as in the example, must be relative to the reST document; Sphinx does not process URLs in an image’s target field.

The image directive has more configurable fields. If image sizes need to be manipulated from reST, we recommend using scale since it is responsive. We hope to provide better support for responsive image sizing.

Be sure to leave a blank line before and after the image directive.

Figure directive

Figures include both an image and a caption.

.. figure:: /_static/images/logos/Logo-MSL.png
   :name: this-is-actually-a-label
   :scale: 15 %
   :target: https://msl.stanford.edu
   :alt: Multi-robot Systems Lab Logo

   MSL Logo
Multi-robot Systems Lab Logo

MSL Logo

Note that the :name: field takes the place of a separate label for hyperlinking. By convention, these labels should be prefixed with “fig-.”

Be sure to leave a blank line before and after the figure directive.

Note on paths to image files

Images are included in the _static/ directory of the git repository for this documentation project. Sphinx requires image assets to be located in this _static/ directory in order to properly copy files into the built website. By using a prefix “/” we indicate that a path is relative to the root of the documentation repository.

Package documentation is hosted in docs/ directories of the git repositories of individual packages. For such package documentation, image files should be placed inside a directory in docs/source/_static/ named for the package itself. This nested directory structure is needed to merge package documentation content into the root documentation build.

Math

Sphinx allows you to write math expressions with a LaTeX-like plain text syntax that will be typeset by MathJax in the browser. MathJax supports AMSMath-LaTeX syntax. This website by Dr Carol Burns provides a comprehensive listing of available LaTeX syntax in MathJax, along with examples.

In Sphinx, you can either write inline expressions with the math role, or block elements with the math directive.

Inline math

Write inline math expressions with the math role. For example, :math:`\sigma_\mathrm{mean} = \sigma / \sqrt{N}` produces \(\sigma_\mathrm{mean} = \sigma / \sqrt{N}\).

Block math

To display math as a block element, use the math directive (be sure to leave a blank line before and after the math directive). For example:

.. math:: \sigma_\mathrm{mean} = \frac{\sigma}{\sqrt{N}}
   :label: math-sample

renders as

(1)\[\sigma_\mathrm{mean} = \frac{\sigma}{\sqrt{N}}\]

Referencing equations

Notice the :label: field in the previous sample; it both annotates the equation with a number, and allows the equation to be cross-referenced with the eq role; for example `:eq:`math-sample` produces (1). Equation references may only be made within the same reStructuredText page as the original math directive. See the Sphinx docs on Math support for more information.

Multiple Equations

Multiple equations can appear in the same math directive. Simply include a blank line between each equation (and don’t include an equation as a argument of the math directive itself).

.. math::

   \nabla \cdot \mathbf{E} = \frac{\rho}{\epsilon_0}

   \nabla \cdot \mathbf{B} = 0

renders as

\[ \begin{align}\begin{aligned}\nabla \cdot \mathbf{E} = \frac{\rho}{\epsilon_0}\\\nabla \cdot \mathbf{B} = 0\end{aligned}\end{align} \]

Aligned Equations

Often when there are multiple statements in a math directive it’s desirable to align those statements around the equals sign, for example. In AMSMath-LaTeX this would be achieved with the align environment. In reStructuredText we can accomplish the same in a math directive.

.. math::

   x &= (a + b)^2 \\
     &= a^2 + 2ab + b^2

renders as

\[\begin{split}x &= (a + b)^2 \\ &= a^2 + 2ab + b^2\end{split}\]

Notice how the alignment point is marked with an & and \\ is appended to each math statement except for the last. Also note how there are no blank lines between math statements.

Source code

For blocks of code, we prefer the code-block directive. This directive has the form

.. code-block:: <language>
   :name: optional-label
   :emphasize-lines: <optional lines to highlight>

   <code>

where

  • <language> can be any token understood by Pygments, particularly py (python), cpp (C++), java (Java), js (JavaScript) and rst (reStructuredText). Specify none to disable highlighting.
  • :name: is an explicit hyperlink label for the code block.
  • :emphasize-lines: is an optional sequence of lines to highlight. This can be comma-separated, with hyphens to indicate spans.

Be sure to leave a blank line before and after the code-block directive.

Including source code examples from other files with literalinclude

The code-block directive is great for code examples written in the reStructuredText source file itself. You might also want to show a code sample contained in a separate file. For this you can use the literalinclude directive:

.. literalinclude:: path/to/example.py
   :language: py

The source path can either be relative to the reST document or relative to the documentation root by prefixing the path with /.

The literalinclude directive also supports code-block fields, such as name and emphasize-lines. In addition, you can selective include ranges of lines with the lines field. For example, to include only lines 10 – 20:

.. literalinclude:: path/to/example.py
   :language: py
   :lines: 10-20

To omit the first two lines from a file:

.. literalinclude:: path/to/example.py
   :language: py
   :lines: 2-

Sophisticated inclusion patterns can be achieved by listing multiple spans, such as :lines: 3-10,20-, which shows the first ten lines and all lines after the 20th.

When including code example snippets from other files, it may be useful to remove indentation. Use the dedent field for that. For example:

.. literalinclude:: path/to/example.py
   :language: py
   :lines: 5-10
   :dedent: 4

will show lines 5 – 10 and remove 4 space characters (presumably because the snippet is inside a Python class or function).

Lightweight syntax for Python code and sessions

You can markup Python code blocks using a lightweight syntax:

::

   print('hello world!')

Interactive python sections can be marked up as

>>> print('Hello world!')
Hello world!

Command line prompts

For generic command line prompts, we use the sphinx-prompt extension so that the prompt character (e.g, $) isn’t selectable. This is great for giving copy-and-paste-ready command line instructions.

For basic bash prompts,

.. code-block:: shell

   mkdir -p hello/world
   cd hello/world

produces

mkdir -p hello/world
cd hello/world

Footnotes

Footnotes should be used sparingly, if at all, in documentation. Prefer inline hyperlinks to other sections. If you do need footnotes, you can make them as follows:

This is a line.\ [#label]_

.. [#label] This is the footnote content.

Note that we had to provide an escaped space for the footnote mark occurring after a period.

The footnote content should occur not far from the inline footnote mark; generally provide the footnote content at the end of the section.

Citations

Citations should be used for scholarly references; use hyperlinks for web native content. Citations can be made as follows:

The LSST Project [Ivezic2008]_ will produce 15 TB of images per night.

.. [Ivezic2008] Ivezic et al 2008. *LSST: from Science Drivers to
                Reference Design and Anticipated Data Products.*
                `arxiv:0805.2366 <http://arxiv.org/abs/0805.2366>`_

Citations are distinguished from footnotes in that the label does not begin with a #.

Comments in ReStructuredText

Provide comments to fellow writers using ..,

.. This is a one-line comment.

..
   This is the first of a multi-paragraph comment.

   The second paragraph.

Avoid using comments to keep around old or alternate versions of text; prefer using Git version control instead.

RestructuredText Formatting Conventions

Text wrapping

When writing reST documentation in Python docstrings, documentation lines should be wrapped at lengths of 79 characters for consistency with PEP8 Python Style Guide.

For reStructuredText documents (e.g., .rst files), reST doesn’t care about line formatting. Emacs users, for example, are free to use hard-wrap formatting lines at 72 characters if that helps you write docs. Whenever possible, we encourage you to use soft-wrapping for your text. This allows others format text columns in their editors as they wish. As well, the GitHub.com code editor does not have hard-wrap auto-formatting. Those making doc edits on GitHub.com will tend to use soft-wrap by default (see ‘GitHub Flow in the Browser’).

When using soft-wrap formatting, you might write one sentence per line (i.e., put a line break after each sentence). As a writer, this has the advantage of making it easier to check the rhythm of your writing, including sentence lengths. Shorter sentences are easier to read. One-sentence-per-line is also semantically correct in the sense of Git.

Indentation

ReStructuredText should be indented consistently with the context, which generally means taking visual alignment cues rather than adhering to a fixed indent width.

In directives, align to the directive’s name:

.. code-block:: python

   print('hello world')

In lists, align naturally with the text:

- First item.

  Another paragraph for the first item.
- Second item.

Note how that alignment adapts to numbered lists:

1. First item.

   Another paragraph for the first item.
2. Second item.

For argument lists in Python docstrings, we indent descriptions by four spaces:

Parameters
----------
x_coord : float
    Particle's x-coordinate.
y_coord : float
    Particle's y-coordinate.

Note

Thanks for Astro Data Lab for the inspiration of this content. See https://datalab.noao.edu/docs/manual/ for reference.