Thanks for your feedback.
We do add ‘Deprecated’ warnings at the top of pages when OPs are deprecated, and in cases where there are major changes to an operators documentation, you will find “TouchDesigner Build” tags at the bottom of each article if you are using an older version.
Another thing to use in conjunction with the documentation is the Operator Snippets which can be launch from any operator or the OP Create Menu. Here’s you’ll find a bunch of examples of how to use different features of operators. Its not exhaustive, as there are 100s of ways to apply each operator, but they usually show a wide variety of techinques you can adapt to your projects.
What I think is missing (for a new user) is context and background information. It reminds me of my time using Zope/Plone. At the time, its official documentation was sparse, but there was a lot of third-party and community support. It was a community of practice moreso than a fully documented system. Which is certainly a valid way of working, but it’s pretty intimidating for a new user, and some folks gave up before “hanging around” long enough to learn the ropes.
TD and its operators are wonderful because they’re so abstract. I think a more “enriched” wiki (as described above) could introduce users to a rich history of research and practice, which would clear up some mysteries and inspire them to stick with it. Let me know if I can help!