use Perl

• This xrl.us business just doesn't have a future (Score:1)

  by qu1j0t3 (6286)

  Hmm, link shortening services. Let me count the ways they weaken the web:
  * will eventually break (see xrl.us TOS)
  * are another point of failure anyway
  * are a privacy liability
  * give no hint at destination (ph1sh, much?)
  * contain no identifying information, so when they do expire, you're totally hosed
  * are not a permanent, unique identifier
  
  Besides, there's no actual rationale for using them here. URLs can be as long as you wish in this medium.
  • Re:This xrl.us business just doesn't have a future (Score:1)

    by audreyt (6654)

    All agreed (and indeed that was just following previous summaries's examples). However, hough 123-characters URLs is a bit too long.

    After some discussion on #p5p, there seem to be a middle path: Link to the full URL, but display the xrl.us address as textual content between anchor tags. Does that sound plausible, or even more insane? :-)
    • Re:This xrl.us business just doesn't have a future (Score:1)

      by audreyt (6654)

      Or, alternately, make the headings themselves links, and remove explicit links-as-texts altogether. Saner? :)
      • Yay! :-) (Score:1)

        by hummassa (6137)

        Now _that_ is saner.
      • Re:This xrl.us business just doesn't have a future (Score:1)

        by chromatic (983)

        My heart would sing a little more if explicit links as texts went away everywhere for good.
  • short links do no harm (Score:1)

    by ferreira (5993)

    P5P summaries also use short links, so that 123-characters-long URLs (like audreyt said) are avoided. These are also used in the summaries as sent to perl5-porters and perl5-summary mailing lists. Both, mailing lists and use.perl are considered transient sources of readable information. In P5P case, the summaries are archived with full URLs at http://dev.perl.org/perl5/list-summaries/ [perl.org] assuring the permanence of these. (Well, as long as the archives themselves they point to survive.)
  • Re:This xrl.us business just doesn't have a future (Score:2)

    by ask (83)

    > will eventually break (see xrl.us TOS)
    
    We haven't actually ever deleted any URLs, and when we do we'll make sure that the expiration logic doesn't expire any of the links used in the summaries. Likely then the web crawlers will keep them "in use" for us.
    
    > are another point of failure anyway
    
    The reason we made the service in the first place was so the Perl community would have one that'd be as dependable (or not ;-) ) as the perl.org services we run.
    
    > are a privacy liability
    
    That's sorta goofy. If

    --
    

    -- ask bjoern hansen [askbjoernhansen.com], !try; do();
    • Re:This xrl.us business just doesn't have a future (Score:2)

      by ask (83)

      Oh -- all that being said, I agree it's better to use the full link when linking from websites. :-)
      
        - ask

      --
      

      -- ask bjoern hansen [askbjoernhansen.com], !try; do();
• none of these links work for me (Score:1)

  by grumpY! (6951)

  what is the secret handshake?
• Please disregard parrot summaries (Score:2)

  by leo (5366)

  It's all outdated and as far I've checked from 2003.
  • Re:Please disregard parrot summaries (Score:1)

    by audreyt (6654)

    Oopsie. Thanks for pointing it out!

    Sorry for being a sloppy reviewer, I'll try to do better next time. :-( Meanwhile, obra++ has Ed'ed the contents away.