'Smart' URLs are navigation tools

Written by Adrian Holovaty on September 26, 2002

"User-Centered URL Design" examines good and bad URL schemes, suggesting Web addresses are "not just a handy way to address network resources. They're also valuable communication tools." It's an interesting counterpoint to an IBM article I pointed out 10 days ago, which proclaimed: "Only techie people glean information about the structure of a site by examining the words between all those forward slashes." I suppose the truth is somewhere in between -- but if a feature helps at least a few people, why not include it?

(Also see the two classics "Cool URIs don't change" and "URL as UI".)

Comments

Posted by Dan Knight on September 26, 2002, at 9:25 p.m.:

I've been dealing with this through the 5+ year evolution of my site. I've used meaningful file names, but eventually gave up on that -- the third column on a topic....

I keep a fairly flat structure: domain/column/year/date.html, so my latest Mac Musings column is http://lowendmac.com/musings/02/0912.html -- no question as to when it was posted, although it gives no indication at all about content.

I agree that the best URLs are short and easy to read to someone.

Comments have been turned off for this page.