Grants:IdeaLab/URL shortener

Inspire campaign

URL shortener

Wikimedia-only URL shortener, working in any language

idea creator• Cantons-de-l'Est

project manager• AFlorence

volunteer• Waiyanlin.lin• Minecraftpsyco

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created on02:21, Tuesday, March 15, 2016 (UTC)

Project idea

What is the problem you're trying to solve?

All Wikimedia pages have many versions. The URL to a specific version is usually long. If a page is from a non-English language, this can be very long and impossible to understand (for instance, these are the URLs of Robert Oppenheimer in Japanese and Russian : https://ja.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E3%83%AD%E3%83%90%E3%83%BC%E3%83%88%E3%83%BB%E3%82%AA%E3%83%83%E3%83%9A%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8F%E3%82%A4%E3%83%9E%E3%83%BC&oldid=54276133 and https://ru.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%D0%9E%D0%BF%D0%BF%D0%B5%D0%BD%D0%B3%D0%B5%D0%B9%D0%BC%D0%B5%D1%80,_%D0%A0%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%B5%D1%80%D1%82&oldid=76527141). It is next to impossible to paste any of these in a mail or a Web page. There are many URL shorteners on the Web, but some have a bad reputation because they are open to abuse (spam, virus, etc.).

What is your solution?

Create a URL shortener, working in any language. For instance, if the reader is Chinese, he should get the ID of the shortened URL in Chinese. To prevent abuse, the URL shortener should only accept addresses from a Wikimedia site, and nothing else.

Project goals

A URL shortener that any user can use to create a shortened URL to copy-paste in a mail, on a Web page or Twitter.

Get involved

Participants

Volunteer Let me check what are the things i can do Waiyanlin.lin (talk) 15:25, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
Volunteer I'll just do whatever I can to help. Minecraftpsyco (talk) 19:37, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
Volunteer Lo que haga falta para ayudar Pp96 (talk) 20:36, 28 March 2016 (UTC)
Project manager if can i help in this idea , i,m ready! AFlorence (talk) 19:31, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Endorsements

There should actually be a permanent shortened link on the left side of the page. Much like OpenStreetMap has. It should always stay the same for a specific article. The RedBurn (talk) 14:55, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
Simple need and workable idea. -Nizil Shah (talk) 19:10, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
I agree with long URLs, they frustrate me a lot, so I often just end up googling or binging the site, which wastes time. Minecraftpsyco (talk) 19:36, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
It is a good idea and a real need that is feasible. Amqui (talk) 17:42, 18 March 2016 (UTC)
Excessively long links should not be a barrier to those who want to share Wikipedia articles. Thunderforge (talk) 05:31, 19 March 2016 (UTC)
We need this for the WMF as well; although I can see how important this can be for non-latin links. Thanks for posting the idea! EGalvez (WMF) (talk) 19:18, 22 March 2016 (UTC)
Support Antigng (talk) 04:08, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
Support, Shorter URL helps memorize. --Stang 05:40, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
Good idea! W8487uu7848w (talk) 11:04, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
This idea could save a lot of space. Mackerni888 (talk) 03:45, 27 March 2016 (UTC)
Not sure why this doesn't exist yet? Note: there's not much use if it's hidden - it should be featured on every article-page...I'd actually prefer a share bar. Fixuture (talk) 22:33, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
Support! Excellent idea, I've been struggling with this on RU wiki, LV wiki, LT wiki (see https://lv.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%A0aurslie%C5%BEu_dzelzce%C4%BC%C5%A1, or https://lt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dain%C5%B3_%C5%A1vent%C4%97). Also, maybe, the links can be not short but rather latinized so that their target can be read by a human before clicking as opposed to short links comprising random ids. SSneg (talk) 07:18, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
Elilopes (talk) 19:08, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

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