Anton Kronseder, co-owner of smartics, traces his path from early coding on the Commodore 64 to founding a thriving Atlassian Marketplace company specializing in documentation tools. His team's focus on accessibility and continuous innovation has made smartics a standout solution within the Atlassian ecosystem.
- smartics started in 2002 enhancing documentation for developers
- productdoc Toolbox enables low-code content management in Confluence
- Ongoing AI integration aims to improve information search and organization
What happened
Anton Kronseder, whose programming career began nearly 40 years ago on the Commodore 64, co-founded smartics to address challenges in developer documentation. Early on, Anton and his partner built an online documentation site using Maven and open source software, but the process was inefficient and hard to maintain, especially when fixing small errors.
Recognizing the need for better collaboration and accessibility, they chose Confluence as their platform to build a set of extensions called the productdoc Toolbox. This solution empowers non-technical users to organize and manage documentation without coding, improving workflows across teams and integrating smoothly with Jira.
Why it matters
smartics’ approach addresses a common pain point in software development — effectively creating and maintaining documentation that is both accessible and dynamic. By enabling low-code and no-code contributions through Confluence, smartics opens the door for more users to structure and improve documentation independently.
The productdoc Toolbox also reflects a broader trend of modular, extensible platforms where teams combine technical and non-technical roles to accelerate collaboration. This adaptability helps users respond to feedback quickly and manage complex information architectures without heavy developer intervention.
What to watch next
smartics continues to innovate by incorporating artificial intelligence into its tools, including machine learning features aimed at enhancing the search and retrieval of information within Confluence. This ongoing development promises to make documentation even more user-friendly and efficient over time.
For those engaged in the Atlassian Marketplace or looking to build developer-focused apps, Anton emphasizes the importance of leveraging the ecosystem and community. smartics’ trajectory shows that success often comes through collaboration, adaptability, and staying open to learning and evolving technologies.