Generate Documentation for Your CLI Tool Automatically

Generate Documentation for Your CLI Tool Automatically Nobody reads docs they have to maintain manually. They go stale the moment you add a new flag or rename a command. The solution: generate documentation directly from your CLI's command definitions. If your code is the source of truth for behavior, it should also be the source of truth for docs. This article shows how to build an auto-documentation system that generates README sections, man pages, and help text from your Commander.js command definitions. The Source of Truth Problem // Your CLI definition IS your documentation program . command ( ' audit <url> ' ) . description ( ' Run a performance audit on a URL ' ) . option ( ' -t, --threshold <n> ' , ' Minimum acceptable score (0-100) ' , parseInt ) . option ( ' -f, --format <fmt> ' , ' Output format: text, json, table ' , ' text ' ) . option ( ' -m, --mobile ' , ' Simulate mobile device ' , false ) . option ( ' --no-cache ' , ' Disable result caching ' ) . action ( auditHandler