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Better Navigation and Version Selection in Duende Docs

Maarten Balliauw Head of Customer Success

The Duende documentation just got better! Our docs cover several products, and each one has their own version: IdentityServer, BFF, Access Token Management, IdentityModel and more. Too often that meant landing on a page about a feature your version doesn't have, or not finding what's new in the release you're about to move to. We changed how the docs navigation works to fix that.

Redesigned Homepage

We redesigned the documentation landing page around 2 journeys:

  • Newcomers to Duende IdentityServer: the hero leads with the three template commands that you can run in a terminal to get a working IdentityServer in the shortest amount of time.
  • Returning users: a product jump list shows each product's latest version, upgrade guides, and an IdentityServer4 migration link, and more.

Browse Documentation Topics

The sidebar now starts with a list of topics: General Information, IdentityServer, BFF Security Framework, Access Token Management, IdentityModel, IdentityModel.OidcClient and ASP.NET Core Introspection. One click takes you from one product to another, and the active topic is highlighted.

Duende docs sidebar showing the list of documentation topics

A welcome side effect of this change is that the tree of all documentation pages below is now shorter, and focused on the product you're interested in.

Pick Your Product Version

Under the topics you'll find the active version. Select the version you run, and pages, navigation entries and sections that don't apply to the selected version disappear. Select 7.3 for IdentityServer, for example, and SAML 2.0 and User Management are gone from the navigation, because they arrived in 8.0.

Version selector in the Duende docs sidebar

Your choice is remembered per product, so picking BFF 3.0 doesn't change what you see for IdentityServer. The version is also part of the URL (?version=7.3), so you can share a link that opens on the right version.

Default Version Display and Preview Features

If you haven't picked anything, you get the docs for the latest stable version, plus the preview content for what's coming next. Right now that means the Spaces and Duende Storage previews planned for IdentityServer 8.1. Preview pages carry a preview badge in the navigation and a notice at the top of the page.

Preview badge on documentation pages in the navigation

Want to see the docs exactly as they stand for a preview? Pick the corresponding preview in the selector.

Versions that are no longer supported are labeled that way in the selector. If you open one, a notice points you to the current documentation, the upgrade guide and the support policy.

Breadcrumbs and Notices

Every page now has a breadcrumb trail above the title, so you can see where you are and jump up a level. When a page only applies to a preview, the notice says so and links to the matching documentation.

Tell Us What You Think

Try it all out in the IdentityServer docs. If you have feedback or questions, or want to share what you are building with Duende, we'd love to hear from you in the Duende Community.

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