What is the most commonly used free or opensource tool to use to
generate Python documentation? I have heard of Epydoc, Pydoc, and
Happydoc, but I have no idea what is most popular. Also, for a bonus
$2, is Pydoc already part of Python 2.3.3?

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Request for Question Clarification by passive-ga on 03 May 2004 12:14 PDT

Are you looking for something to document your code for you, or a
standard of documentation for use in your own code? Or both?

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Clarification of Question by loqui-ga on 03 May 2004 12:31 PDT

I  am looking for a tool to use in documenting my own code. The reason
for wanting to use the most popular tool is that it should be
something that will still be available (and still functional) in the
future adn because it will save me the trouble of downloading & trying
out a lot of different packages. Also, I'm assuming that if it is the
most widely-used version, it will probably adhere to whatever
standards are out there.

PyDoc is the most popular documentation tool, by a long shot, as far
as I can determine.

Looking at the sourceforge pages for Epydoc and HappyDoc, they have
3,500 and 7,500 downloads total, respectively. PyDoc has been included
in the core python release since 2.1, and is used to generate
documentation for some of the largest python projects (including
Python itself).

PyDoc comprises not only an automatic documentation generator, but
also a help system that can be used to search through standard
documentation. This help system is built into the default Python
editor (IDLE).
For an example of PyDoc generated documentation, here are the docs for
the standard modules in Python 2.3:

http://pydoc.org/2.3/

For an introduction to PyDoc:
http://www.onlamp.com/lpt/a/python/2001/04/18/pydoc.html

PyDoc is a good tool, but in order to be fully effective, it is best
to use it in combination with consistent naming conventions, and heavy
use of docstrings.
For more about docstrings:
http://www.python.g2swaroop.net/byte/ch07s07.html

This answer is a little scattered, I know. It's my first answer in two
years, so I'm a little rusty. Please let me know if there are any
problems with this answer, and I will endeavour to correct them.

Thanks! The number of downloads is a good measure.