Author Topic: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page! (Read 7943 times)

Eeems · « **on:** March 13, 2014, 01:57:09 am »

It may not be pretty yet, but it's functional. Ourl.ca now has a main page that you can use to shorten topic/post urls. You can also use it to convert the old post/topic ID links from before the upgrade to new ones that will now work.
Please don't use this to update old posts though, we are going to run a script to update them all automatically. If you were to update it before we ran the script it would invalidate your change. You can update your posts with the new full URLs (like this: http://www.omnimaga.org/news/ourl-ca-gets-a-home-page!) generated by the forum. Updating with the generated ourl.ca link will cause the breaks when we get around to running our conversion though.

Sorunome · « **Reply #1 on:** March 13, 2014, 05:18:27 am »

Looking nice! (And yes, it is lacking CSS) but it is still helpful.
Suggestion: Linking of all the other pages like /issue, /request and img.ourl.ca etc.

Hayleia · « **Reply #2 on:** March 13, 2014, 07:38:05 am »

When you say you are going to run a script to convert links, does that mean you'll edit all posts on Omnimaga to have new links ?
If so, that would not solve the problem since there are links to Omnimaga on TI Planet, Cemetech, in readmes on ticalc, on Google, ...

Why not have something server based that detects if the url is "old" and converts it into a new one instead ? This way, no need to change anything in any post and every new and old links work.

Adriweb · « **Reply #3 on:** March 13, 2014, 08:55:08 am »

Well yeah, that ... ^

Sorunome · « **Reply #4 on:** March 13, 2014, 09:46:26 am »

As already mentioned in the other thread, you'd have to have some junk on all new urls indicating that it are new URLs

Hayleia · « **Reply #5 on:** March 13, 2014, 10:01:37 am »

Yeah, sorry about posting in two topics. I first posted in the other one then thought this one was more appropriate.

Well why not add some junk as you say (that's what I meant with "new folder"), if that allows some redirection to be done and prevents links on every website to be broken_? I think it's better than just fixing posts on Omnimaga and losing Google referencing.

Eeems · « **Reply #6 on:** March 13, 2014, 10:07:22 am »

I have provided an API on that site for other sites to use to convert links.
As soon as I have finished converting all the links on the old Omnimaga posts I will be contacting the admins of TI-planet, ticalc etc with instructions on how to do it on their own site. Cemetech already has the information on how to do so.

Quote from: Sorunome on March 13, 2014, 05:18:27 am

Looking nice! (And yes, it is lacking CSS) but it is still helpful.
Suggestion: Linking of all the other pages like /issue, /request and img.ourl.ca etc.

On the list. I've got to rewrite how ourl.ca handles those types of links though. Currently it's hard coded and I'd prefer it to be database driven so it's easier for me to expand upon the link set.

Quote from: Hayleia on March 13, 2014, 10:01:37 am

Yeah, sorry about posting in two topics. I first posted in the other one then thought this one was more appropriate.

Well why not add some junk as you say, if that allows some redirection to be done and prevents links on every website to be broken ? I think it's better than just fixing posts on Omnimaga and losing Google referencing.

All decisions behind how URLs are going to be handled going forward have already been decided by the administrative team. Google will eventually update all of it's cached results and there is little I can do about it.

Hayleia · « **Reply #7 on:** March 13, 2014, 10:17:10 am »

Well Google will probably change it indeed, but what about topics on Cemetech, TI Planet and every other website who linked to Omnimaga ?

Eeems · « **Reply #8 on:** March 13, 2014, 11:03:35 am »

Quote from: Hayleia on March 13, 2014, 10:17:10 am

Well Google will probably change it indeed, but what about topics on Cemetech, TI Planet and every other website who linked to Omnimaga ?

Please read the main post in full. I have answered this question there.

Hayleia · « **Reply #9 on:** March 13, 2014, 11:29:16 am »

Well I already read it in full several times to be sure I didn't read what you wrote, but I did. You are saying "we will fix links on Omnimaga, and other websites can do it too", and I didn't read "we are going to use a solution on our end that doesn't need anyone doing anything such as url-rewriting as Adriweb said or adding something to new urls to detect old ones and convert them".

Eeems · « **Reply #10 on:** March 13, 2014, 11:33:04 am »

Quote from: Hayleia on March 13, 2014, 11:29:16 am

Well I already read it in full several times to be sure I didn't read what you wrote, but I did. You are saying "we will fix links on Omnimaga, and other websites can do it too", and I didn't read "we are going to use a solution on our end that doesn't need anyone doing anything such as url-rewriting as Adriweb said or adding something to new urls to detect old ones and convert them".

Yes, we will fix the links on our end and have provided a tool for external sites to fix the links they have. We will not do url rewriting because there is no way to determine if the link is an old one or not. Changing the current new urls by adding a directory path to them just adds a level of complexity that makes it more difficult to maintain it going forward, which is what fixing all the IDs was to avoid.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #11 on:** March 13, 2014, 02:11:33 pm »

Quote from: Eeems on March 13, 2014, 11:33:04 am

Quote from: Hayleia on March 13, 2014, 11:29:16 am
Well I already read it in full several times to be sure I didn't read what you wrote, but I did. You are saying "we will fix links on Omnimaga, and other websites can do it too", and I didn't read "we are going to use a solution on our end that doesn't need anyone doing anything such as url-rewriting as Adriweb said or adding something to new urls to detect old ones and convert them".
Yes, we will fix the links on our end and have provided a tool for external sites to fix the links they have. We will not do url rewriting because there is no way to determine if the link is an old one or not. Changing the current new urls by adding a directory path to them just adds a level of complexity that makes it more difficult to maintain it going forward, which is what fixing all the IDs was to avoid.

Actually, to prevent the old vs new URL conflict issue, the trick would be to increment every ID by 100000 for topics and 1000000 for messages, then do the URL rewriting thing. In such scenario, determining if a link was an old one or not would only become a problem once or if the forums reach 100000 topics and 1 million posts.

However, if the script can easily let other sites bulk-update URLs in existing posts and Omni updates its own links, this would work too, since there are only two active calc sites that links to Omnimaga on a regular basis.

However, I heard that PhpBB3 has a Skynet-like anti-hacker protection where if someone runs a bulk SQL query or PHP script that edits multiple tables/posts at once, then PHPBB3 sees mankind as a threat then the forum database ends up sh*tting itself, becoming permanently unuseable.

Author Topic: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page! (Read 7943 times)

Eeems

Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Sorunome

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Hayleia

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Adriweb

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Sorunome

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Hayleia

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Eeems

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Hayleia

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Eeems

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Hayleia

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

Eeems

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!

DJ Omnimaga

Re: Ourl.ca Gets a Home Page!