# Does AI-Generated Documentation Have Value?

DevFeed: [Does AI-Generated Documentation Have Value?](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/does-ai-generated-documentation-have-value-30751.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<http://blog.vanillajava.blog/2025/01/does-ai-generated-documentation-have.html>)

Author: Peter Lawrey (noreply@blogger.com)

Published: 2025-01-10T17:42:00Z

Content type: opinion

Language: en

Sources: [Vanilla Java](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/vanilla-java.md>)

Topics: [Artificial Intelligence](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/ai.md>), [Documentation](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/documentation.md>), [user guide](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/user-guide.md>), [Code](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/code.md>)

Tags: [ai](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ai.md>), [code](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/code.md>), [developers](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/developers.md>), [documentation](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/documentation.md>), [opinion](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/opinion.md>), [user-guide](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/user-guide.md>)

## AI overview

This opinion article evaluates the usefulness of AI-generated documentation. Based on a subjective review of generated user guides, it argues that most output is correct but uninteresting, while some content is wrong and a smaller portion is compelling. Reviewing and heavily editing the output can still reveal documentation improvements, corrections, testing ideas, performance checks, and clarifications.

## Source excerpt

As many have observed, at best, AI generates either: Mundane, repetitive documentation or code that most experts already know or If an expert doesn't know it, they can ask an AI to explain it anyway. Is it the case that if an AI can generate it, it's not worth adding to your documentation or code? While this is usually the case, there is still value in reading AI-generated documentation as a means of reviewing and validating what you might write differently. In this post, I show how changing the documentation can affect the AI's output and how reviewing it can be a useful exercise. Estimating the value of AI-generated documentation I tried to gauge the relative value of AI-generated documentation for my knowledge and set expectations for others. I asked o1 pro to generate user guides in several different ways I considered effective for: a simple class and package a large class and package a complex class and package Then, I subjectively estimated how many points made were compelling, interestingly incorrect, correct but not interesting, or just plain wrong. I ignored repeated points. This is what I concluded: Type Average points per query Percentage Correct but not interesting 35 80% Just plain wrong 5.4 13% Compelling to keep 2.1 5% Wrong But Interestingly 0.8 2% This assumes I crafted the query to be as specific as possible. Without a specific query, the AI can generate a lot of irrelevant or wrong content. Understandably, this can lead people to conclude that AI is unusable. However, there is still value in reviewing AI-generated documentation. Why Bother Reviewing AI-Generated Content? If we go into this process with the mindset that the content will be ruthlessly edited, we can extract value for relatively low effort. For example, each file I have reviewed had, on average approx 3 points that are compelling to keep or errors worth addressing. Is this point worth emphasising in your official documentation? Is the suggestion so far off that it needs immediate cor