Hi,
I’m new to these forums (I access via nntp), and I’m curious about why so many posts use tinyurl
links instead of the full link. I mention this because from the full link I can guess what it is
before clicking (and I’m often offline, or on a site with a proxy that filters out tinyurl.com).
Is there a reason for using tinyurls in forums? :-?
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” GM (Elessar))
Yes, it’s a ‘web’ feature. I have a perl script that runs with claws to
decode (written by another nntp forum user). Can Thunderbird run
scripts?
Here is a link to it:- TinyURL - Pastebin.com
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Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 11 (x86_64) Kernel 2.6.32.12-0.7-default
up 5 days 5:14, 2 users, load average: 0.24, 0.10, 0.03
GPU GeForce 8600 GTS Silent - Driver Version: 256.35
On 2010-06-30 23:53, malcolmlewis wrote:
>
> Yes, it’s a ‘web’ feature. I have a perl script that runs with claws to
> decode (written by another nntp forum user). Can Thunderbird run
> scripts?
>
> Here is a link to it:- TinyURL - Pastebin.com
I assume that creates the small link, but what I would need is returning to the full, long, link
name so that I can know what it is.
And worse, that is impossible being off-line (no internet connection). Using nntp allows me to read
the forums when I have more free time, which is when I don’t have internet on my laptop.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” GM (Elessar))
Hi
No, it convert a TinyURL into the full URL 
–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 11 (x86_64) Kernel 2.6.32.12-0.7-default
up 5 days 6:01, 2 users, load average: 0.08, 0.08, 0.06
GPU GeForce 8600 GTS Silent - Driver Version: 256.35
I think obscuring URLs is a) unnecessary and b) potentially dangerous. Everybody should be able to see what a link is pointing to before clicking it.
On Thu, 01 Jul 2010 04:06:02 +0000, gropiuskalle wrote:
> I think obscuring URLs is a) unnecessary and b) potentially dangerous.
> Everybody should be able to see what a link is pointing to before
> clicking it.
I think one of the challenges that the use of tinyurl by the software is
trying to deal with is URLs that are long enough to wrap, which can cause
issues for some readers.
Jim
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Oh, I didn’t know that. I never had problems with long URLs - beside that, there’s always the alternative to do the wrapping himself by using [noparse][text is here](URL is here)[/noparse]-tags, this way one can see the url in the statusbar by hovering over it with the mouse.
On 2010-07-01 06:24, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Thu, 01 Jul 2010 04:06:02 +0000, gropiuskalle wrote:
>
>> I think obscuring URLs is a) unnecessary and b) potentially dangerous.
>> Everybody should be able to see what a link is pointing to before
>> clicking it.
True.
That’s my point, one of them, while I’m online with my own computer. Right now I’m not, but I have
another one available on a corporate network wich will filter out suspicious looking links. The full
link gives me an idea of what it is without clicking on it, and I have a chance of typing it in the
corporate machine. Or I already know that page and don’t need to click it.
> I think one of the challenges that the use of tinyurl by the software is
> trying to deal with is URLs that are long enough to wrap, which can cause
> issues for some readers.
And that is true as well, but this is a software (client) bug. It is a problem with thunderbird,
unless you are in html mode and use the function to include a link, or use the “preformated”
paragraph style, that doesn’t wrap.
Some mail clients, like Alpine⁽¹⁾ do not wrap a link if the sender types it as <somelink>, but not
all clients use this convention.
It is a problem…
⁽¹⁾ (uppercase (1), needs utf8 >:-) Alpine does also nntp, I’ll try that one as well 
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” GM (Minas Tirith))
On Thu, 01 Jul 2010 05:26:02 +0000, gropiuskalle wrote:
> Oh, I didn’t know that. I never had problems with long URLs - beside
> that, there’s always the alternative to do the wrapping himself by using
> ‘text is here’ (URL is here)-tags, this way one can see the url in the
> statusbar by hovering over it with the mouse.
I think it depends on what’s reading it - perhaps it’s just an NNTP thing
at that, since many NNTP clients wrap to 72 characters.
Jim
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
On Thu, 01 Jul 2010 17:05:39 +0000, Carlos E. R. wrote:
> On 2010-07-01 06:24, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Thu, 01 Jul 2010 04:06:02 +0000, gropiuskalle wrote:
>>
>>> I think obscuring URLs is a) unnecessary and b) potentially dangerous.
>>> Everybody should be able to see what a link is pointing to before
>>> clicking it.
>
> True.
>
…]
You bring up some good points and questions, Carlos - I’ve asked as well,
because I’ve noticed some cases where tinyurl isn’t used (there’s a post
in the multimedia forum that doesn’t), so I’m not quite sure what the
criteria is.
I’ll see what I can find out.
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator