While sorting through the various synod inboxes this morning (quite an undertaking, after being out of the office for two days for our staff retreat), I was reminded of a problem that comes up quite often. In our LutherLink account, someone had posted the URL (Uniform Resource Locator--the web address) to a page on the ELCA website, but the link got "broken" and readers were unable to follow it. That happens a lot with long URL's, and the ELCA has some VERY long ones! Here's what it was supposed to be:
but
text-wrapping--either LutherLink's or the sender's e-mail
program's--displayed it like this:
rocess/JTF-Human-Sexuality/Resources/Reports.aspx
You see the
problem: The long URL "broke" onto two lines, which a web browser can't
read. It dropped the second line, which worked about as well as dialing
only the first four digits of someone's phone number!
There are several ways around this problem, but here are two--one an old favorite, and another a new favorite.
The old favorite is TinyURL (http://tinyurl.com/). It's free, it's fast, and it works like a charm. You simply copy the long URL, go to TinyURL, paste it into the box, and presto! you have a short URL that links directly to the original page. Using the URL from above, TinyURL changes
into
reducing 121
characters to a mere 25. You may then paste the TinyURL into e-mail,
websites, etc., and it will take your readers directly to the original
page. I have used it extensively and never had a problem. (Indeed, I
have begun to notice TinyURL addresses appearing in e-mail from ELCA
offices!)
A similar service is provided by SnipURL (http://www.snipurl.com), which I have only recently discovered and so haven't used as much. It functions pretty much the same as TinyURL, paring
down to
The main
difference between TinyURL and SnipURL is that the latter allows you to
create an account where you can keep track of your "snips," as they
call them, and it also provides some customizing features that TinyURL
doesn't.
Neither of these tools will help you fix broken links in e-mail that you receive--it's the good old copy-and-paste to put them back together, when that happens--but they can help immensely with long URLs that you send out in e-mail, put on your website, or post to blogs or discussion groups. I encourage you to experiment with both services and see if they can help you keep your URLs a manageable size!
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