Skip to main content

Automatic Markdown Documentation and Project Directory Tree Generator

Project description

Automatic Markdown Documentation and Directory Tree Generator

This script generates 2 files (directory_tree.md and all_files_content.md) of structured Markdown documentation for any project directory:

  • directory_tree.md: Directory structure with Git metadata (branch, commit, repo, etc.)
  • all_files_content.md: Grouped file index and content previews (with truncation for large files, CSV/Excel previews, and special handling for binaries and logs)
  • Skips configured folders/files (see configuration)
  • Automatically adds the documentation folder to .gitignore
  • Supports GitHub/GitLab links to each file at current commit (if Git is configured)

Documentation Example

Installation

A. Install from PyPI (recommended for most users)

pip install document-folder-structure

B. Install from Source (GitHub)

  • 1. Clone the repo:
git clone https://github.com/sdkng44/document-folder-structure.git
cd document-folder-structure
  • 2. Install dependencies:
pip install -r requirements.txt

Usage

A. As CLI (after installing from PyPI):

Once installed, run from any folder providing the full path to the project you want to document as an argument:

document-folder-structure C:\path\to\myproject

or in Linux:

document-folder-structure /path/to/your/project

B. From Source (if you cloned the repo):

Always run from the root of the cloned repo (where the document_folder_structure/ folder is).

python -m document_folder_structure C:\path\to\myproject

or in Linux:

python -m document_folder_structure /path/to/your/project

The documentation files will be created inside the INTERNAL_DOCS/ folder within the target project directory you specified.

Optional arguments:

--config Path to JSON configuration file (default: config.json)

--max-depth Maximum directory depth to display (default: 4)

--tree-title Custom title for the directory tree Markdown

--truncate-lines Max lines for README/large files (default: 10)

--truncate-chars Max characters for file previews (default: 2000)

--max-log-lines Max lines to preview for .log files (default: 10)

--max-preview-columns Max columns to preview in CSV/Excel tables (default: 20)

--no-lines Turn off line numeration on Markdown file content preview (default show line numeration)

Example with arguments (on Windows):

document-folder-structure C:\home\user\myproject --max-depth 3 --truncate-lines 8 --max-preview-columns 15 --no-lines

When using --no-lines, line numbers will not be shown in the file previews (except for CSV/Excel tables). Section headers, line totals, and file separation are always included to keep the documentation clear.

Output

All output files are placed in INTERNAL_DOCS/ inside your project root:

  • directory_tree.md: Directory tree with Git and file extension summary
  • all_files_content.md: File index and preview for all non-binary, non-excluded files

If .gitignore does not exist, it is created. The folder INTERNAL_DOCS/ is always added to .gitignore (if not present), to help avoid committing generated documentation.

Configuration

You can customize exclusions, tree directory depth and truncate file content on Markdown documentation in a JSON config file. First 4 lines are for files, extensions and directories exclusion before the tree generation, 5-12 lines are for truncate file content on Markdown documentation.

Example config.json:

{
    "excluded_dirs": ["node_modules", "__pycache__", ".git", "deps", ".fingerprint", "build", "incremental"],
    "excluded_files": [".gitignore", ".849C9593-D756-4E56-8D6E-42412F2A707B"],
    "excluded_extensions": [".log", ".tmp", ".bak", ".db-shm", ".db-wal", ".npmrc", ".prettierignore", ".prettierrc"],
    "max_depth": 4,
    "truncate_files": ["README", "LICENSE", "CHANGELOG", "CONTRIBUTING", "SECURITY"],
    "truncate_exts": [".md", ".txt"],
    "truncate_dirs": ["docs"],
    "truncate_file_pairs": [["document_folder_structure", ".html"]],
    "max_truncate_chars": 2000,
    "truncate_lines": 10,
    "max_log_lines": 10,
	"max_preview_columns": 20
}

Features

  • Handles large files, binary files, and non-text files smartly (binary omitted, logs/README truncated)
  • Markdown code highlighting by extension (.py, .js, .md, etc.)
  • CSV files: Markdown table preview of first N rows and M columns (configurable)
  • Excel (.xlsx): Markdown table preview of first N rows per sheet and up to M columns (requires openpyxl)
  • Customizable file/folder exclusions by name, extension, or directory
  • Adds the documentation folder to .gitignore automatically (with checks for missing/newline)
  • Shows a summary of unique file extensions found in the tree
  • Supports Linux, macOS, and Windows

Limitations

  • .xls (old Excel format) preview is not supported—use .xlsx instead.
  • For correct GitHub/GitLab links, your repo must have a remote named origin.

Example Output

After running, you'll find the following in INTERNAL_DOCS/:

  • directory_tree.md
  • all_files_content.md

Both files are readable Markdown, suitable for project documentation, onboarding, or quick file audits.

Requirements

  • Python 3.6+
  • openpyxl (for .xlsx preview)
  • All dependencies listed in requirements.txt

License

Apache License 2.0


Created by sdkng44@gmail.com

Project details


Download files

Download the file for your platform. If you're not sure which to choose, learn more about installing packages.

Source Distribution

document_folder_structure-0.2.3.tar.gz (17.3 kB view details)

Uploaded Source

Built Distribution

If you're not sure about the file name format, learn more about wheel file names.

document_folder_structure-0.2.3-py3-none-any.whl (16.5 kB view details)

Uploaded Python 3

File details

Details for the file document_folder_structure-0.2.3.tar.gz.

File metadata

File hashes

Hashes for document_folder_structure-0.2.3.tar.gz
Algorithm Hash digest
SHA256 5107334edc97e5763287f56a493cacdfe3aa426a3462ac4bb358a86f76e30c27
MD5 07f7de8eb7005b534a3ad6d9b9d28592
BLAKE2b-256 496474f30922497ecf62af2584172254c3989fc0ec76d9958ac58198ae2e7d70

See more details on using hashes here.

Provenance

The following attestation bundles were made for document_folder_structure-0.2.3.tar.gz:

Publisher: python-pypi-publish.yml on sdkng44/document-folder-structure

Attestations: Values shown here reflect the state when the release was signed and may no longer be current.

File details

Details for the file document_folder_structure-0.2.3-py3-none-any.whl.

File metadata

File hashes

Hashes for document_folder_structure-0.2.3-py3-none-any.whl
Algorithm Hash digest
SHA256 b6bed34230de101cb1148b54b9deaeef42d00bf9ffc5c31e280f70c6a80a9d87
MD5 df54dd831a8773577d297d4cb218d7c1
BLAKE2b-256 d0cc0c16cb41cfa7775386d9d5af6e617b4e93abcdb58d34ad77bcf6d4653860

See more details on using hashes here.

Provenance

The following attestation bundles were made for document_folder_structure-0.2.3-py3-none-any.whl:

Publisher: python-pypi-publish.yml on sdkng44/document-folder-structure

Attestations: Values shown here reflect the state when the release was signed and may no longer be current.

Supported by

AWS Cloud computing and Security Sponsor Datadog Monitoring Depot Continuous Integration Fastly CDN Google Download Analytics Pingdom Monitoring Sentry Error logging StatusPage Status page