Questions tagged [urls]

a character string used to represent a location on the Internet that can be typed or accessed by a user. URLs often present in human-readable the organization behind the website and the function of the specific page being navigated to, in addition to their purely functional use.

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206 votes
10 answers
42k views

Should a sentence ending with a URL terminate with a period?

Suppose my web service needs to send a password recovery e-mail message to the user. The message will contain a link (with some disposable token). Something like: To reset your password please ...
sharptooth's user avatar
  • 5,897
73 votes
11 answers
5k views

Should people be able to change their usernames?

So, you want to change your username to something new. Should an application allow you to do this? Let's say that you have a unique URL that points to your profile. Let's assume it is human ...
JohnGB's user avatar
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65 votes
8 answers
33k views

Do long domain names really affect user experience?

I have already purchased one, and I think it might be too long. The domain name is 27 characters, including ".com". However, most browsers now show suggestions based on previous visits to sites, so ...
Phoenix Logan's user avatar
41 votes
5 answers
4k views

Do users trust shortened URLs?

I've got some problems with shortened URLs personally; they're really easy to create and not descriptive, so it's fairly easy to make them link to malware. I'm talking about links like http://bit.ly/...
Ben Brocka's user avatar
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37 votes
4 answers
11k views

Are URLs important for the user?

I am developing a web application and wondering if it is important to have URLs which are explicit and informative for the user or not. Or should I just focus on the good design of the web pages ...
Billal Begueradj's user avatar
26 votes
9 answers
3k views

Is my suspicion correct, that QR codes will be a short-lived standard with little effect?

We are all starting to see the square, scannable QR codes on billboards, advertisements, etc. I have been increasingly thinking that this standard will not last long. My logic is this: Any handheld ...
estephan500's user avatar
20 votes
5 answers
3k views

Should we be using the new TLDs (.coffee, .international) instead of the traditional TLDs (.com, .org)?

It seems like certain TLDs tend to have a negative connotation to them, at least among my peers, such as .info, .us, .biz. I'm not exactly sure why, but I personally don't tend to trust .biz domains ...
Kevin Evans's user avatar
19 votes
2 answers
14k views

Underscores vs. hyphens in URLs

I'm trying to come up with a page-naming convention so that each page in a web application I'm developing has the human-friendliest URL possible. The current URL structure of the web application is: ...
jqp's user avatar
  • 696
16 votes
6 answers
2k views

User perception on non ".com" top level domains

I am thinking of buying a .co domain as a .com is not available for my company name. While the .co is cleaner and shorter many of us have gotten used to .com. Do users only remember the domain name ...
Carlene's user avatar
  • 161
16 votes
3 answers
798 views

Are Domain Hacks usable?

A Domain Hack is when the top level domain (ux.stackexchange.com) and sometimes the subdomain (ux.stackexchange.com) is used to spell out a word instead of being used as a country code (.us, .uk) or ...
Ben Brocka's user avatar
  • 40.9k
15 votes
5 answers
2k views

Why do large websites redirect away from their 'pretty' urls?

Sites such as gmail.com and outlook.com both redirect away from their original 'pretty' URLs, only to replace it by an unreadable and unpredictable one. Outlook seems to actively add a server to the ...
Lg102's user avatar
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15 votes
2 answers
6k views

Should web users see the http:// prefix to websites?

Chrome seems to have been the first to start hiding the http:// prefix last year, and there seemed to be significant contention. Rather than show the full prefix chrome lops off http:// and displays ...
Ben Brocka's user avatar
  • 40.9k
14 votes
6 answers
1k views

Website Addresses - To Hyphen or Not to Hyphen ?

Eg which is better: www.ux-exchange.com or www.uxexchange.com ? Background: Looking at what's already registered it looks like the non-hyphened versions are more popular. But does that make ...
PhillipW's user avatar
  • 11.3k
14 votes
5 answers
2k views

Best Practice Users and Businesses URLs

I need help in figuring out what is the best URL structure for my website. On the website, I’ll have pages for users and business and would like to give each a custom profile URL. Here are the ...
AlGallaf's user avatar
  • 420
14 votes
6 answers
5k views

What would be the best way to let a user add a URL to a form?

Currently our webapplication simply shows a textbox with no validation at all. There is a small icon placed next to the textbox that allows the user to open the URL in a new browser window to check ...
Thorsal's user avatar
  • 387
14 votes
2 answers
530 views

How can I convey that a domain name with an obscure TLD is a URL?

We've seen an increasing number of obscure TLDs including things like .ninja and .pizza. If I were to build a website and get a domain name like example.pizza, how would I go about convincing a user ...
HPierce's user avatar
  • 243
14 votes
3 answers
22k views

Why do websites use "you are being redirected..." pages?

Frequently after logging in a website - specially old ones - I see the following: Welcome! You are being redirected, please click here if your browser does not redirect you. And similar pages ...
Alex's user avatar
  • 243
13 votes
5 answers
1k views

How important is it to consider the URL when developing the UI for a web application?

When developing web applications, do user-friendly URLs matter? Blog platforms seem to be split on the issue. For example, Tumblr posts are frequently in the form blogname.com/post/967129380, which ...
Brendan Berg's user avatar
  • 1,214
12 votes
3 answers
2k views

Domain strategy from a UX perspective?

Having a domain strategy seem to be the latest thing. The discussion about it circles mostly around legal, seo or branding issues but if you want to look at it from a usability perspective - how ...
Tony Bolero's user avatar
  • 7,304
11 votes
5 answers
5k views

Is per-company subdomain or single URL better for web app

I'm writing a web application, the application is for small companies where each company will have multiple users. What is better: giving each company a sub domain (so you access the app at my-...
Nir's user avatar
  • 1,257
11 votes
3 answers
6k views

Pagination urls

Currently considering a couple different URL schemes for pagination: /blog/ -> First result page /blog/1/ -> First result page /blog/2/ -> Second result page Another ...
sqwk's user avatar
  • 213
10 votes
6 answers
23k views

What is the casing convention for URL routes?

Is using a URL like http://coolsite.com/doSomething common? Or should such a page have a URL like http://coolsite.com/dosomething or http://coolsite.com/do-something ?
ripper234's user avatar
  • 833
10 votes
3 answers
2k views

Is it a good idea to redirect expected page name misspellings/typos for critical web pages?

For example, would redirecting www.example.com/loogin to www.example.com/login be fine? Would it be better to automatically redirect users to the correct page or display a page stating that the user ...
AlGallaf's user avatar
  • 420
10 votes
3 answers
5k views

Are long query strings in URLs bad for usability?

Lots of web applications use the query string to store bits of information. This can result in long paths in the url bar. For example: http://www.example.com/login.htm?ts=1231231232222&st=223232&...
ArchieVersace's user avatar
9 votes
4 answers
686 views

Percentage of users who edit the URL of the site they're on?

The company I work for rents out vacation properties, with an alphanumeric ID for each property. Such as http://www.example-domain.tld/abc123456 There are SEO recommendations for using a slug / ...
Calle's user avatar
  • 193
8 votes
3 answers
1k views

Is domain name important for user experience?

Is it important for the domain of a website to be chosen so that it is simple to type? For example, consider delicious-dot-ly (delicious.ly). Would it be fair to say that the difficulty of typing ...
Filippo oretti's user avatar
8 votes
3 answers
390 views

Using "user" in a URL structure

This question follows on from this question: Better term for “user”. If it's bad UX to call people using your product "user" then isn't it also bad UX to structure your URL's as YourDomain.com/user/...
JohnGB's user avatar
  • 68.4k
8 votes
4 answers
632 views

Is it better to replace the homepage with the user profile after log in?

I'm working on a web application where I also need to code a user registration/login feature. I'm in the process of working on the user-side of the system (in other words, what the user sees after ...
xTCx's user avatar
  • 181
8 votes
1 answer
734 views

What URL's characteristics have a real impact on the UX?

I'm starting a blog soon so I've been thinking about what I should take into account when choosing an URL. Some variables I've thought about: Length, meaning, suffix, memorability, SEO. Related to ...
Alejandro Veltri's user avatar
6 votes
2 answers
2k views

Domain name best practice when the last letter of the first word and first letter of the second word are the same

If I'm registering a two word domain in which the last letter of the first word, and the first letter of the second word are the same, is it better to drop usage of one of those letters? Examples: ...
Automatic Yes's user avatar
6 votes
3 answers
2k views

Should I use greek characters in my urls?

I'm setting up a website for a client who's Greece based and I'm not quite sure how to go about the urls. There are two options I'm considering at the moment: Use greek characters and have the urls ...
kat_indo's user avatar
  • 163
6 votes
5 answers
1k views

Best URL Structure for Businesses across Multiple Countries

I am currently designing a social media website that is going to be focused on businesses from multiple countries and I am trying to come up with the best URL structure for the website. I do not want ...
AlGallaf's user avatar
  • 420
6 votes
2 answers
279 views

Is it OK that url is changed after invalid submit of form?

Let's say I am at Create new user page and current url is /users/new. When I submit this form with invalid data (e.g. mismatched passwords), user is redirected to /users. Is it OK that user will see ...
Andrei Botalov's user avatar
6 votes
3 answers
265 views

Fusing words for website name: confusing or doable?

Arguably UX starts with the domainname. Well perhaps a bit far-fetched, so please feel free to suggest what might be a bitter fit than UX.SE for this question, but here it is anyhow. I'm looking at ...
Geert-Jan 's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
575 views

Is there evidence that users ever look to a website's URL as a breadcrumb for navigation?

On-the-page breadcrumbs often mirror the directory path anyway. To my mind, it stands to reason that that clear, human-readable, hierarchical URLs can enhance a site's usability[1]. But I have no idea ...
in_flight's user avatar
  • 397
6 votes
2 answers
882 views

Recommended URL structure for products and categories in MVC app?

For example, suppose I have a site with products and product categories. I'm trying to come up with a good intuitive url structure. I want to use name slugs throughout rather than database ids. In ...
User's user avatar
  • 191
6 votes
1 answer
175 views

Where to redirect after inviting someone?

We have 3 states for Users: Active, Invited and Disabled. Each user with the specific state is broken into a different tab. For example: download bmml source – Wireframes created with Balsamiq ...
TheCloudlessSky's user avatar
5 votes
3 answers
183 views

Best way of calling urls on my website

I have a website where factories are stored in different categories, but now i was wondering how to call the factories in my urls. I have an url for showing factories in a category: http://mydomain....
Kees Sonnema's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
514 views

Paths Short or Long

I am working through a problem with path names. The previous version of a site used short codes for url paths. Coming into this for a new project and the short code based paths, while deterministic, ...
Frank Robert Anderson's user avatar
5 votes
5 answers
454 views

How to handle history events from scolling and other in-page events

On a website that has several sections and subsections on one page, I was thinking about implementing scrolling to a new section as a new browser history event. The main reasoning for doing so is to ...
kontur's user avatar
  • 7,644
5 votes
2 answers
665 views

User Account Management URL structure

What is the clearest, most logical way to lay out user account management url structure? For example: /users/login /users/(signup|sign-up) /users/myaccount/(edit) /users/username/(edit) /users/(my)...
Anthony's user avatar
  • 480
5 votes
3 answers
387 views

Does URL structure really matter to users?

I have seen a bunch of answers regarding URL structure and SEO. However, I would like to know does URL structure really matter to users? For example, if I have: Parentsite.com/brand1 Parentsite.com/...
JustBlossom's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
243 views

How can I reassure users about an unfamiliar domain name?

I have a service, example-service.com. I have customers customer-a.com, customer-b.com, etc. We host a service for them on urls like customer-a.example-service.com Users who are familiar with ...
John Bachir's user avatar
5 votes
5 answers
323 views

How does a CCTLD affect user behavior?

I'm in the process of consolidating several sites into one. Content that previously lived at http://example.co.uk/ will now live at http://example.com/uk/, content from http://example.fr/ will move to ...
dennislees's user avatar
  • 11.6k
5 votes
4 answers
3k views

URL for public user page - hyphenated or camelCase?

What are some pros/cons for using camelCase vs hyphens in URLs for a username? As in, what is better (in terms of readability, writability, style, SEO, other): example.com/justinBieber (a la ...
sellarafaeli's user avatar
5 votes
4 answers
3k views

Use subdomains or directory structure for URLs?

I'm curious if it's considered better practice to use a subdomain (e.g. store.website.com) or a directory (e.g. www.website.com/store) when linking to separate sections of a site. Assuming both ...
Kris Harper's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
221 views

Any research showing which is easier for humans? SUB.Domain.com or Domain.com/SUB

This may be splitting hairs. But I'm trying to provide a url in an ad. Two choices are: Prize.Domain.com or Domain.com/prize I could also, I guess use www.Domain.com/prize
Clay Nichols's user avatar
  • 1,548
5 votes
2 answers
647 views

Is it okay to have different content in main page every time user refresh?

I want to make my landing page to display a project (the details page). However I also want to make it keep changing project every time user refresh. Is this a good practice? Also, for the url, ...
framelita's user avatar
  • 105
5 votes
2 answers
359 views

Does a country specific top level domain (TLD) affect perception of a (non-US) community site?

Note: This is similar, but unrelated, to this question, which asks about using a non-US TLD for a US site. Do country specific TLDs influence users' perception of the relevance of content on a site? ...
Justin's user avatar
  • 765
4 votes
6 answers
1k views

What is the best experience for generating unique usernames?

We are building a social network and as part of user onboarding, we want to assign each user a unique username The only currently defined use case for the username is the profile URL, i.e. if your ...
Gajus's user avatar
  • 1,220