I've noticed that auto creation of URL links that the vB software does has at least one issue (maybe more).

The url is truncated if there is a comma in it. I see these on a regular basis (especially news articles), so it would be a good idea if they could fix it. Bellow is an example.

Incorrect:
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html

Correct (w/ vB code):
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html

Correct (w/ HTML code):
<a href="http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html" tergat=_blank>http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html</a>

I've also seen some cases where the really long URLs get truncated even when manually typing in the vB code (only HTML code works in those cases).

Commas are used as a delimiter in vBulletin, which means that specific parsing quirk isn't a bug -- it's a feature. :)

Even so, it's a dumb idea because commas are used often enough in URLs that they shouldn't be used as a delimiter. Perhaps a better idea is to use a comma followed by a whitespace (or other non-valid url character) as the delimiter.

Jason, when typing in the URL correctly in vB, you don't have to repeat the link inside the code like:

[u<B></b>rl="ht<b></b>tp://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html"]ht<b></b>tp://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html[/u<b></b>rl]


Instead all you have to do is to just add [ur<b></b>l] and a [/u<b></b>rl] at the beginning/end of the URL like:

[u<b></b>rl]ht<b></b>tp://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html[/u<b></b>rl]


Both will give you http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,6462,00.html.


Yeah, it's still a pain, but easier than repeating the URL.




[Edited by namja on 04-17-01 at 10:47 AM]

Jason,

You'll be pleased to know that both the comma parsing issue and the lengthy URL problem are corrected in vBulletin 2.x. Just did some testing and it worked fine... :)

-Adam

Yeah, I was just doing the links that way as examples of what should happen with the automation.

2.0 is close to being a released product. We're doing some testing with Release Candidate 1 and it worked great....

Since we are on the subject I just have to ask....

Who in the world came up with the idea to use commas in an URL and transversely, why in the world would anyone make a comma a legitimate character for URL parsing?

As a programmer I only see this as a problem... like quotes in a database. :D

Same here, Ash. :)

Regardless, the issue's corrected in vBulletin 2.0.

It will be interesting if the other autoURL bug (or is it feature?) has been fixed. When I put an italic designator in front of a URL and the end-italic designator at the end of an automatic URL, the URL will be displayed, but it will not be automatic.

Actually, I've used that as a "feature" before. So, maybe I am not at all hot to change this.

<font color=blue>Originally posted by BadAsh:
Who in the world came up with the idea to use commas in an URL and transversely, why in the world would anyone make a comma a legitimate character for URL parsing? As a programmer I only see this as a problem... like quotes in a database.<font color=black>

Some of the database-oriented webpage generators make webpages using the comma as the separator instead of using spaces, dashes, or underscores to build a URL. Perhaps some of these companies had their input to Microsoft when MS was seeking input from various companies during the design of Win95. The Operating System was seeking to be as compatible with everyone as possible. As you know, there are other weird characters allowed in URL and directory names as well....

If you could roll the clock way back, then perhaps you could eliminate the allowed use of comma.