Web development has become increasingly complex in recent years, and now a new website has launched — with the backing of several major industry players — in an effort to become the definitive resource for developers looking to explore web standards. Web Platform Docs, which launched today in a self-described "alpha" form, wants to become "the place to come for answers to your trickiest (and simplest) development and design questions about the Open Web Platform." The project is backed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standards body, as well as the likes of Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Mozilla, Nokia, and others.

The site currently consists of a wiki, forums, a chat channel, and a blog, but the ambitions run much higher. According to the blog post announcing the site, the hope is that eventually Web Platform Docs will be a source for "accurate, up-to-date, comprehensive references and tutorials for every part of client-side development and design." It's also envisioned that new standards will be discussed on the site as well, with developers being able to lodge concerns, suggestions, and fixes before new standards are locked down.

In terms of moving forward, the site hopes to harness the power of the engaged web community to drive its efforts forward. "Over the next few months, we will be asking extraordinary members of the community to help lead teams that will tackle particular challenges," writes Doug Schepers, "whether that is creating new content to strengthen a particular topic, or helping translate the site into their local language, or patrolling the site for outdated, erroneous, or biased content."



