Embedded documentation

Every Drupal website contains administrative documentation links embedded into its pages and modules. This documentation is very important to get correct because it lives with the Drupal installation and cannot be changed once the core version is frozen for distribution. The editable version of the embedded documentation is maintained here on drupal.org in the modules section of the Handbook, and on the introductory page of each core and contributed module.

During feature freeze of each new major Drupal release, the Documentation Team updates the module pages in the handbook so that the help is consistent with the latest Drupal version. Once the wording is correct, the embedded doc pages are then rolled into Core. This process is described in more detail on the following pages: [Insert links to detail pages here.]

Getting started:

1. Familiarize yourself with the documentation Handbook Style Guide. This guide should be treated as the overarching law related to all written text.
2. Prepare yourself for working with embedded docs by reading the Embedded Documentation style guidelines. You should write embedded docs with these guidelines in mind since all submitted documentation will be reviewed for compliance with these two guidelines.
3. Study the established format by reviewing several module pages .

The documentation team and the Drupal developers have decided that the format of module pages and administrative help docs need to be short and scannable. If you would like to know more about why users scan web documentation instead of reading it fully, review the Why Users Scan Instead Of Read article on Jakob Nielsen's site.