[pestaa]

I have never ever understood the desire to make installation details and lists of requirements the first thing I see on software docs. I come across all these tiny packages or full-blown applications and I have to literally spend minutes to figure out what they actually do.

Being open source is not a real advantage any more, but it takes so little effort to summarize your project at the top of the README, so please do it so I can fall in love with your stuff.

[simmons]

I've noticed that this problem exists even beyond software documentation. It's often hard to figure out what a company does by looking at their web site, for instance. I wish every such document started with "Product Foo is ____. It does ____."

[drivingmenuts]

I think that comes from the desire to find out if it's even worth exploring the project on a given hardware/software setup.

It may be a throwback, but it's still a good idea.