damned_colonial: Convicts in Sydney, being spoken to by a guard/soldier (Default)
damned_colonial ([personal profile] damned_colonial) wrote in [site community profile] dw_suggestions2010-07-15 06:58 pm
  • Add Memory
  • Share This Entry
Entry tags:

Pretty URLs

Title:
Pretty URLs

Area:
entries

Summary:
Generate a pretty URL for each entry in a journal, so that instead of:

http://some-journal.dreamwidth.org/12345.html

you see:

http://some-journal.dreamwidth.org/2010/07/15/five-things-make-a-post

Description:
The generated URL should include the date in YYYY/MM/DD format, and a simplified version of the post's subject line. If two posts with the same subject happen in one day, just add "2" to the end of the second one (and increment as necessary).

The original numeric URLs should keep working so that links don't break, but should rewrite to the pretty ones.

This will provide context in all kinds of handy situations, eg. when someone pastes a URL to you or when you hover over a link, you can see what's likely to be at the other end of it.

Poll #3836 Pretty URLs
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 90

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
29 (32.2%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
22 (24.4%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
31 (34.4%)

(I have no opinion)
8 (8.9%)

(Other: please comment)
0 (0.0%)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only
kyrielle: painterly drawing of a white woman with large dark-blue-framed glasses, hazel eyes, brown hair, and a suspicious lack of blemishes (Default)

[personal profile] kyrielle 2010-07-17 04:47 am (UTC)(link)
Hmmm. What if it became http://myjournal.dreamwidth.org/12453.html?detail=2010/05/15/waah-life-is-hard?

This looks to a non-techy user as if the link contains the date and title (and it sort of does), but a techy user will recognize it as a top-level post with some parameters. The site could easily ignore the 'detail' field altogether, so the original URL would work, the URL would work if the date changed, the URL would work if I decided to type http://myjournal.dreamwidth.org/12453.html?detail=no-really-i-hate-this-feature.... Heh.
damned_colonial: Convicts in Sydney, being spoken to by a guard/soldier (Default)

[personal profile] damned_colonial 2010-07-17 05:04 am (UTC)(link)
Doesn't help with googleability for those who want it, as google largely ignores HTTP parameters (the stuff after the question mark).
matgb: Artwork of 19th century upper class anarchist, text: MatGB (Default)

[personal profile] matgb 2010-11-10 09:56 pm (UTC)(link)
Yes, it would.

TBH, I personally can do without the date, other than the small advantage that the end URL can be hacked off to take you to an archive page. Which this stops.

But the post URL with another / after it would be perfectly good for SEO and most usability purposes.

I'd still rather have it follow the date format for archive views, which is good for usability (remember when Browsers had inbuilt up buttons?), but not essential.
Flat | Top-Level Comments Only