Introduction

Maritime documentation is the invisible infrastructure that keeps vessels safe, compliant, and operational. Yet the industry manages this critical information with tools barely evolved from the filing cabinet. Word documents emailed as PDFs. Procedures copy-pasted across fleets. Cross-references maintained by memory. Treating documents as structured data rather than flat files transforms every aspect of how maritime organizations create, manage, validate, and reuse their most important software: it's content. This guide explains the technology behind that transformation (Abstract Syntax Trees and Markdoc) and shows why it matters for everyone from vessel operators to compliance managers. No programming experience is required. Every technical concept is explained from first principles, with analogies drawn from the maritime world you already know.