When will the Unity3D documentation also have a search function for the rest of it ?

The Unity3D documentation only has a search function for its scripting reference.
But what about the rest of the documentation,the user manual and the component reference ?
That would make things a bit more easier.
Please Unity Tech,make it available.

Thanks.

 

CTRL-F? That's what I use and I've found more or less everything I need.

 

As a workaround, the docs are online, so you can use google to search the entire docs that way.

--Eric

 

No,you don't understand.
The search function must be built into the unity documentation itself.
Just like the scripting reference.
The scripting reference has a search function built in.

 

I understand fine, that's why I wrote "as a workaround". The effect of using google to search the docs is basically the same as if it had a built-in search function, it's just not quite as convenient.

--Eric

 

I consider convenient docs a killer feature. The docs definitely need more love IMO.

 

+1 for this feature (to be honest it should have been there since day one...)

 

Same for the forum search. Search functionality is broken since the new forum's layout day one. Not possible to access individual posts via forum search. Again we have to access it via google. Links pointing to posts for example at Uniknowledge don't work correctly means always pointing to thread page one. Very annoying!. It's like burying all the collected knowledge to make us dig through at least one more layer to get the goodies. And now we even have another place to dig, unityanswers. While I like/appreciate the idea of unityanswers (I really do!) it's in fact a place for redundant information and procrustination. The fact that we need unityanswers at all is indicating that something goes wrong with documentation. 90% of the questions show me that people couldn't find the answer to their question in the docs even though the answer should be there. And this, is flooding unityanswers, again adding a layer you have to dig through to get to the interesting stuff. Diving into unityanswers is like assembling a puzzle. Answers have to be gathered from tiny bits and pieces. It would be much easier with larger chunks.

Several Engines slipped through my hands in the last 10 years and Unity is the only one that is still sticking to my designer fingers because of its docs. Unity's docs are way better than of it's competitors. Still, I think it's absoluteley possible to push the docs and related info like script reference etc. to the next level. Docs and Accessability of information are essential. As I said before, it's a killer feature.

I see Unity is hiring a huge bunch of people. Would be good to see a UXPexpert getting hired whose sole mission is loving the docs. In its current state the docs give me a feeling of "coder's art" or "artist's-code". If the Unity Ninjas will seriously go for it, please Ninja guys, don't do the same fragmented bullshit that Apple did with its docs.

 

google custom unity search

http://www.google.com/cse/home?cx=001712401338047450041:csfhqk-trfa

 

Did you try it before posting this link? I entered "garbage collector" and other keywords but it failed completely means no output at all.

 

Try again; it works fine.

--Eric

 

It works for me. You might want to try searching for something that you would normal want to find in the Unity manual. Like input.

 

No, it doesn't! Tried in Safari and Firefox with all kind of keywords, also with "input".

 

It works fine in Safari and Firefox. It's just a google search...something must be quite wrong for that not to work.

--Eric

 

The wrong thing was Google ajax search api being blocked by a plugin in Safari and Firefox. Now it works. Thanks!

 

Well, Unity3d documentation suck anyway, so waste of time searching of answers there

 

No, the Unity documentation is quite good for the most part.

--Eric

 

Well, it's not going to tell you how to make a game, that's your job

 

It could be much more accessible but I disagree with "suck" and "waste".

For example Bob Berkebile iTween's doc has a nice approach. It has working small samples (web player builds ) not just bare code snippets. Quite convenient to see what the code is supposed to do, the required unitypackages are commercial (inexpensive) though. Breaking up a Unity tutorial into chunks based on doc topics might work too.

BTW hippocoders link to Unity search should be made sticky or simply made part of the docs

 

Would be interested in the parts that you don't put into the "quite good" category

 

The parts like this.

I really prefer the "bare code snippets". I don't want to sort through a lot of cruft just to see what the code is supposed to do in context. That's one thing I hate about the MSDN docs, where you practically have to dig through the code for an entire word processor just to get an example of String.Contains or something. (Which is an exaggeration of course, but that's what it feels like sometimes!) Remember, the script reference is just that: a reference. It's not supposed to teach you how to code. The other two sections of the docs are more descriptive and in-depth as far as teaching you how to use Unity.

--Eric

 

Yeah, absolutely, hehe. Bumped into these ones, too. Very bare and streamlined.

Oh, I'm not against bare code snippets. And good to have it streamlined too. Actually I learned a lot from these … how to code … and still learning. The other 2 sections are mostly about how to use the editor interface. While I'm not a big fan of MSDN docs, either, but browsing through the word processor helped me a lot. Also I think it doesn't have to be like MSDN. Why not having a "core" mode of the script reference and a "detailed" mode. I guess that at least 50% of the users don't have a coder background, even if it is only 25% users with non-coder-background, it's quite a chunk. I'm pretty sure these would largely benefit from better details and learn a good amount of coding with less headache. I'm also sure it's doable with not too much effort.

1. reference
2. bare code snippets
3. details (implementation + working samples) not visible for pros
4. better search semantics via Unitysearch
5. nice to have: localisation (could be a community effort), e.g. check localisation approach of 3d-coat.com

 

Good for beginner and for getting some basic overview. More advanced topics are not covered at all. For example skinned meshes and animation. There is one silly page in official documentation and one not commented example project. Technical documentation is not existing. I want to know cost of functions, best approaches, what is in Unity3d slow etc. I really dont have a time to do experiments and dozens of scripts just to find out these basic, which should be in documentation at first. Imagine you have game studio and you pay your people. You dont have time to let them waste 1-2 years crawling forum and experimenting just to lear HOW is this suppose to work. And these people already know, how to do games, they just need to know how this is done in Unity. Documentation should be written in such way, that even somebody, who knows nothing about 3d engines would be able to learn everything in right way. Not just do it somehow.
If you buy game engine, you have cca 2 years to finish game, you cant spent it crawling on forum and hoping, that you find that crucial information burried somewhere.

We have repeatedly troubles to get same basic information, which would any skilled game developer ask, when he see new 3d engine. It looks like offical documentation is written by people, who never made any game and dont understand, what are typical questions and problems.
Funny is, that lots of 3rd party products from unity3d community have excellent documentation. Why? Because it is done by somebody, who knows what is his product suppose to do and how.

 

For some information about optimization you can take a look into http://unity3d.com/support/documentation/Manual/iphone-GettingStarted.html or http://unity3d.com/support/documentation/Manual/Advanced.html. As far as I remember expensive functions are often described as expensive. Anyway a studio would test for their specific scenario, anything other than that is not reliable in my opinion, or would buy premium support.

 

I of course know this. These are only basics. Btw, some articles there are out of date....