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Author Topic: Why the invisible links?  (Read 2054 times)

Offline Fitz

  • Mad Scientist
  • Posts: 924
    • The Website of Fitz
Why the invisible links?
« on: May 19, 2022, 08:21:13 PM »
Is there some valid reason for making links within posts invisible?

By which I mean that they're formatted by the boards' styling to look exactly like all the rest of the text. Unless the link is published as the entire URL (i.e. https://blahblahblah.com/blahblah.html) then there's no visual indication that any given word or phrase might be a hyperlink.

It's a poor design decision from the point of view of usability. Hyperlinking is at the very core of the internet, and making links harder to find is a bad idea.

Online zemjw

  • Supporting Adventurer
  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • *
  • Posts: 2091
    • My blog
Re: Why the invisible links?
« Reply #1 on: May 20, 2022, 09:15:44 AM »
Yup, agreed  :(

I always enclose mine with "u" tags, so at least they look like proper links, eg

Code: [Select]
[u][url=xxx]link text[/url][/u]

It's okay to type that on a full-sized keyboard, but has far too many hoops to jump through on a tablet or phone o_o

Offline Cherno

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2515
Re: Why the invisible links?
« Reply #2 on: May 20, 2022, 09:35:38 AM »
I agree, it's annoying. I circumvent it by encapsulating links in bold or teal-colored markers.

Offline Ray Rivers

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 5911
Re: Why the invisible links?
« Reply #3 on: May 20, 2022, 11:44:26 AM »
Just use the color tabs... its been like this for years and years.

Offline fred

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 4360
    • Miniature Gaming
Re: Why the invisible links?
« Reply #4 on: May 20, 2022, 04:45:44 PM »
This feels that it should be an easier config setting within the SMF admin interface, and at its most complex a couple of lines of CSS to update the colour for links (and probably those lines exist already as the default is to use a different colour for links, so it’s just the colour values that need changing away from Black)

Offline FramFramson

  • Elder God
  • Posts: 10681
  • But maybe everything that dies, someday comes back
Re: Why the invisible links?
« Reply #5 on: May 20, 2022, 06:17:14 PM »
Yes, it's a bit of work, but I always colour (navy) and underline my links here.

Would be nice if it were the same as links most everywhere online and highlighted by default.


I joined my gun with pirate swords, and sailed the seas of cyberspace.

 

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