Offline documentation for various programming languages?

Question

I recently found this: http://be.php.net/get/php_manual_en.chm/from/a/mirror. It's a .chm file that contains all the documentation for PHP which you can normally find on their site. Handy for offline use.

I'm wondering, does anybody know of similar things for other languages. Complete offline documentation that you can use if you don't have wireless for a while.

For C#, Visual Studio gives you the option to download and install the entire online documentation as a part of the VS2008 install, so if you have Visual Studio 2008, then you have the C# offline documentation.

EDIT: if you're gonna say this and that is possible, please post hyperlinks.

This is what we have now:

• PHP: http://be.php.net/get/php_manual_en.chm/from/a/mirror
• Java: http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp#docs
• C: http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/manual/
• MS SQL server: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=765433F7-0983-4D7A-B628-0A98145BCB97
• Python: http://docs.python.org/download.html
• The complete MSDN library: http://www.microsoft.com/express/download/msdn/Default.aspx
• The Common Lisp HyperSpec: ftp://ftp.lispworks.com/pub/software_tools/reference/

Answer 1

For Java you can download the entire API to use offline.

Answer 2

btw, the Visual Studio docs (MSDN) also include documentation for JScript, VBScript, HTML and CSS. Back when I programmed PERL I always installed perldoc.

Downloading the documentation is pretty much the first thing I do if I've got any serious work to do in an unfamiliar language. Just reading through the API is like mining gold!

Answer 3

Sun provides downloadable versions of the Java platform documentation.

Java SE Downloads

Scroll down the page and look for the link called Java SE 6 Documentation. It is a series of HTML files covering the entire Java SE JDK. It can be handy to have it stored locally, but because there is no search functionality, its uses are somewhat limited.

Answer 4

Most language should provide that.

Some examples:

Java: Java SE 6 docs (below on the page)

Perl: Unix versions of perl typically come with full docs as manpages and perldoc (some Linux distributions put these into extra packages); I suppose Windows versions do the same

C: the GNU libc library has downloadable docs

Answer 5

Visual Studio comes with the C# specification, installed by default in

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC#\Specifications\1033

Answer 6

While not strictly a language you can build docs for Ruby on Rails by doing the following

rails sample_project
rake rails:freeze:gems
rake doc:rails
rake rails:unfreeze

and then use or take yourself a copy of the doc/api folder

Answer 7

MS SQL Server ships with a whole load of documentation know as "Books Online". Despite the name you can downlaod these from MSDN.

Answer 8

Python also has downloadable documentation. As a result, most operating systems which provide Python also provides a documentation package. For instance, on Debian, this is package python2.5-doc (one package per version).

Install it and you can browse the documentation offline. Very convenient for a laptop which is not always connected.

Answer 9

You can also download MSDN to get documentation for VB.NET, C#, C++ and various Windows & Component APIs

Answer 10

Common Lisp has the hyperspec. A complete guide the language and its libraries.

Common Lisp Hyperspec

Answer 11

I actually mirror a portion of the PHP site for myself, just once a week, by RSync (which is quite efficient, only downloading about 1/6th of what a full download would take).

A couple of advantages of a local copy running on my own server is that the shortcuts (for example php.net/array_merge) work, and I've got the full notes as well.