# System Patterns

## System Architecture

The MainWP.dev documentation system follows a CI/CD architecture with the following components:

1. **Source Repositories**: Two MainWP source code repositories that contain the code to be documented.

2. **GitHub Actions Workflow**: Automated workflows that monitor source repositories for changes and trigger the documentation generation process.

3. **phpDocumentor Engine**: The core documentation generation tool that parses PHP source code and generates structured documentation.

4. **GitHub Pages**: The hosting platform where the generated documentation is published and made accessible to developers.

5. **Documentation Structure**:
   - Subdirectories for generated API documentation
   - Main directory for custom content and developer resources

## Key Technical Decisions

1. **phpDocumentor 3.7.1**: Selected for its robust PHP documentation capabilities and active maintenance.

2. **GitHub Actions for Automation**: Chosen to provide seamless integration with the source repositories and automated workflow triggers.

3. **Subdirectory Organization**: Decision to place generated documentation in subdirectories to maintain separation from custom content.

4. **Configuration Exclusions**: Configured phpDocumentor to exclude specific dependencies to focus documentation on relevant code.

5. **Error Handling Strategy**: Implemented comprehensive error handling and logging to ensure reliability of the automated process.

6. **GitHub Pages for Hosting**: Selected for its seamless integration with GitHub Actions and zero-cost hosting solution.

## Design Patterns in Use

1. **Observer Pattern**: GitHub Actions workflows observe repository changes and trigger documentation updates.

2. **Factory Pattern**: phpDocumentor configuration creates different documentation outputs based on source inputs.

3. **Facade Pattern**: Simplified interface to the complex documentation generation process through GitHub Actions workflows.

4. **Strategy Pattern**: Different documentation strategies applied to different components of the MainWP ecosystem.

## Component Relationships

1. **Source Repositories → GitHub Actions**: Source code changes trigger GitHub Actions workflows.

2. **GitHub Actions → phpDocumentor**: Workflows execute phpDocumentor with appropriate configuration.

3. **phpDocumentor → Documentation Output**: phpDocumentor generates HTML/XML documentation from source code.

4. **Documentation Output → GitHub Pages**: Generated documentation is deployed to GitHub Pages.

5. **Custom Content → GitHub Pages**: Manually created content is preserved in the main directory.

6. **Error Logs → Monitoring**: Error handling system captures and reports issues in the documentation process.