Index/ AESOP/ Recursive Self-Help System

Recursive self-help system

Every product has help pages. They are a copy of the product, kept somewhere else. Copies drift as the product matures.

So we stopped keeping a copy. The AESOP Transformation OS help reads itself.

01

The product is the documentation.

Typical help systems are static, and get more useless as the app iterates. The app is the one description of itself that is always current. A set of agents read the running app and rebuild the help from it, so the help is only ever as old as the last change.

02

How it fits together

The running app current by definition Web crawler documents the frontend Code crawler reads the backend One index rebuilt on every change A question Retrieval meaning and words An answer with its sources An honest miss and where to look searchable asked not found found
03

What it reads

A web crawler signs in as a real account and documents the frontend.
Frontend

How to use it

  • Where each thing lives
  • What each button and link does
  • What each field asks for
  • The steps on each screen
A code crawler reads the backend to keep current on how the app works.
Backend

How the app works

  • The steps in each process
  • What each agent does
  • The rules that decide an outcome
  • How the pieces connect