link repair

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link repair is the practice of repairing broken hyperlinks and sometimes images on your personal site, especially on older posts where the links (or images) were valid as of the time of the post but have stopped working since.

Why

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Repair your links and images on old posts so when people find them, they still have a good experience (what you intended when you posted it) when they click on links in your posts.

IndieWeb Examples

Tantek

Tantek Çelik has repaired the following:

• link (on 2026-144) in https://tantek.com/2010/031/t2/world-moving-to-html5 to use an Internet Archive version, noting in a parenthetical that the original link and its shortlink were found to 404 as of a more recent date, thus also implying the date of repair. The original post text including old shortlink is still viewable at the Twitter syndicated copy.

Repaired version:

"No one will be using Flash ... The world is moving to HTML5." -Steve Jobs #ipad
https://web.archive.org/web/20100201063905/http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/01/googles-dont-be-evil-mantra-is-bullshit-adobe-is-lazy-apples-steve-jobs (original link 404, and its shortlink j.mp/9uWJVN, as of at least 2026-144) @Tantek Çelik January 31, 2010

Original (deliberately blocked autolinking):

"No one will be using Flash ... The world is moving to HTML5." -Steve Jobs #ipad
http://j.mp/9uWJVN longurl @ http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/01/googles-dont-be-evil-mantra-is-bullshit-adobe-is-lazy-apples-steve-jobs/

• links and images (on 2026-199) in https://tantek.com/2010/255/b1/oslo-addendum-norwegian-web-interviews to use Internet Archive versions, noting in parentheticals the original links/images as of when my post was published along with redirect information if any of the repaired links.
  • insertions marked up with <ins> (styled with a yellow background)
  • <del> for deletions of no longer working Google Translate links.

Brainstorming

How to repair

How to repair broken links (or images)

• Use Internet Archive copies of your broken links (or images) to as close to the time of when you published your blog post with the now broken links (or images)
• Clearly indicate in your post that you have edited it (long) after the fact and changed the links (or images) to use Internet Archive copies
• Perhaps also note when the links (or images) broke, were redirected, or some other unexpected behavior

How to handle an intentionally deleted destination

• What should you do if a link points to a website that someone has intentionally deleted? It may be more respectful to leave the link broken?
  • Perhaps it is best to ask the site owner if you can contact them as a first step?

See Also

• longevity