Docent

Turn any GitHub repo into a public-facing, self-maintaining website.

Docent turns a GitHub repository into a public-facing static website. It reads the repo — commits, issues, releases, the README — and writes a small site that explains what the project is, what’s been shipping, and what’s open. The site lives in /docs inside the same repo, deploys to GitHub Pages, and updates itself on a schedule through Claude Code Routines.

Who it’s for

A solo maintainer or a small team with a project that deserves a better introduction than a README. Docent is useful when people show up from search or a link and want a human-readable answer to “what is this and should I care” — and currently get a wall of markdown.

Docent is not a replacement for API documentation tools like Docusaurus or MkDocs. Those describe how a library works. Docent describes what a project is: the pitch, the status, the story so far — for visitors who might never read the code.

How it works

Two install commands bring the skill into any Claude Code session. From there, one conversation sets up the site: Docent asks about tone and cadence, reads the repo for design signals, scaffolds an Astro site under /docs, generates the initial content, and opens a pull request.

After merging, a daily Routine keeps the site current. The same Routine decides whether to refresh the status page, write a journal post, or both — based on what’s happened in the repo since the last run. Nothing goes live without a pull request.

Docent has five modes, each a procedure the skill runs when you ask for it:

• init scaffolds the /docs site and writes the first content.
• update refreshes the status page and overview as issues and the README change.
• digest writes a journal post summarizing recent activity.
• release turns a new tag into a changelog entry.
• triage drafts suggestions for new issues, without ever touching them automatically.

The generated content — overview, journal posts, status summaries, changelog — lives in /docs/content/ as structured MDX and JSON. An Astro site template in /docs/src/ renders it. The two halves are owned separately: Docent writes the content; you own the presentation.

Getting started

Install the skill into your repo, then open Claude Code and say:

set up Docent for this repo

Docent walks through the rest. See the README for the full install steps, or the SPEC for the design.

What this site is

This site is Docent’s own dogfood. Every page you can reach from the nav was generated by the same skill Docent ships to users. If something here reads badly or looks wrong, that’s a signal the skill itself needs work — and you can help by reporting a bug or proposing a fix.