06-27-2026, 08:35 PM
I keep going back and forth on this. Some projects I see have massive READMEs with screenshots, badges, installation guides, API docs - the works. Others are just a one-liner and a link.
For my personal projects I settled on:
I stopped including badges. They are almost always stale and add noise without value.
What is your structure? Does it change depending on whether it is a library, a CLI tool, or a web app?
For my personal projects I settled on:
- One line saying what it does (not what it IS)
- Quickstart - literally the minimum to get it running
- Config options if any
- Why I built it / what problem it solves
I stopped including badges. They are almost always stale and add noise without value.
What is your structure? Does it change depending on whether it is a library, a CLI tool, or a web app?