# `cloud_sptheme.ext.role_index` – JSON Role Index

Added in version 1.8.

## Overview

This sphinx extension for the HTML builder places a file called `roleindex.json` in the output directory along with the documentation. This file contains a dictionary which mapping all reference ids (made via `:ref:` or `:doc:`) to a 3-element list of `(page, anchor, title)`

This is useful for integrating a Sphinx manual into the online help of web application – context-specific help can be provided by looking up a predefined `:ref:` tag within the json file, and redirecting the user to the appropriate page and anchor location.

As an example, see the roleindex.json for this documentation.

Warning

This extension should be considered “beta” quality. It was recently written, may have unknown issues, and may need to be revised.

## Configuration

This extension reads the following `conf.py` options:

> `role_index_style`

> > style of json output – can be `"compact"` (the default), or `"pretty"` (for debugging).