Building Documentation#

This directory contains the documentation source files for NVIDIA Dynamo.

Prerequisites#

Python 3.11 or later
uv package manager

Build Instructions#

Option 1: Dedicated Docs Environment (Recommended)#

This approach builds the docs without requiring the full project dependencies (including ai-dynamo-runtime):

# One-time setup: Create docs environment and install dependencies
uv venv .venv-docs
uv pip install --python .venv-docs --group docs

# Generate documentation
uv run --python .venv-docs --no-project docs/generate_docs.py

The generated HTML will be available in docs/build/html/.

Option 2: Using Full Development Environment#

If you already have the full project dependencies installed (i.e., you’re actively developing the codebase), you can use uv run directly:

uv run --group docs docs/generate_docs.py

This will use your existing project environment and add the docs dependencies.

Option 3: Using Docker#

Build the docs in a Docker container with all dependencies isolated:

docker build -f container/Dockerfile.docs -t dynamo-docs .

The documentation will be built inside the container. To extract the built docs:

# Run the container and copy the output
docker run --rm -v $(pwd)/docs/build:/workspace/dynamo/docs/build dynamo-docs

# Or create a container to copy files from
docker create --name temp-docs dynamo-docs
docker cp temp-docs:/workspace/dynamo/docs/build ./docs/build
docker rm temp-docs

This approach is ideal for CI/CD pipelines or when you want complete isolation from your local environment.

Directory Structure#

docs/ - Documentation source files (Markdown and reStructuredText)
docs/conf.py - Sphinx configuration
docs/_static/ - Static assets (CSS, JS, images)
docs/_extensions/ - Custom Sphinx extensions
docs/build/ - Generated documentation output (not tracked in git)

Dependency Management#

Documentation dependencies are defined in pyproject.toml under the [dependency-groups] section:

[dependency-groups]
docs = [
    "sphinx>=8.1",
    "nvidia-sphinx-theme>=0.0.8",
    # ... other doc dependencies
]

Troubleshooting#

Build Warnings#

The build process treats warnings as errors. Common issues:

Missing toctree entries: Documents must be referenced in a table of contents
Non-consecutive headers: Don’t skip header levels (e.g., H1 → H3)
Broken links: Ensure all internal and external links are valid

Missing Dependencies#

If you encounter import errors, ensure the docs dependencies are installed:

uv pip install --python .venv-docs --group docs

Viewing the Documentation#

After building, open docs/build/html/index.html in your, or use Python’s built-in HTTP server:

cd docs/build/html
python -m http.server 8000
# Then visit http://localhost:8000 in your browser