Lemmy needs an instance-aware way to link to communities (and posts and comments)

irdc@derp.foo to Lemmy@lemmy.ml – 32 points –

Hi all,

I’ve been observing and participating in this community for about a week now. I’m liking it so far, but one thing I’m really missing is a way to link to other Lemmy content in a way that’s instance-aware.

For example, if I were to want to link to !risa@startrek.website, I’d link to https://startrek.website/c/risa. But then I’d end up at a Lemmy instance where I don’t have an account; I’d really prefer to be redirected to https://derp.foo/c/risa@startrek.website.

So here’s my proposal: create a central Lemmy redirection service where people can set their instance (in a cookie). The idea would be that people can link to, say, https://example.com/c/risa@startrek.website, and be ensured us lemmings end up on an instance where we can actually post.

Linking to posts and comments should ideally be part of this as well but whould involve a little more work.

18

create a central Lemmy redirection service

This is contrary to what the Fediverse is about. !risa@startrek.website is already unique and an identifier to universally refer to that community. It automatically links to https://your-instance-URL/c/risa@startrek.website which makes absolute sense, because you have an account on your instance.

If you want to visit !risa@startrek.website just open the link with your instance. Either by using the URL or by cop&pasting the URL into the search field, or by something like lemmy Link in your browser.

This is contrary to what the Fediverse is about.

I can understand how this doesn’t really fit well with the decentralised paradigm. I personally am more than proficient enough to deal with such shortcomings. However, it’s still a drag, and many other people will be scared away because of it.

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on version v0.18.0 if you write !risa@startrek.website it should create a link that points to that community on your instance.

Beside Lemmy 0.18.0 linking primarily to your own instance's mirror of the community from other instance, there is also a browser addon trying to solve this issue if you ever end up on a wrong instance. (If you do not find the button to redirect to your instance, try refreshing the page.)

Posts and comments have yet to be implemented in this way, but instance-agnostic links already work for communities. Simply typing !memes@lemmy.ml or !bicycles@lemmy.ca or whatever will give you a link which redirects users to that page on their instance. Your instance might have to be running the latest Lemmy version, though.

That’s (probably, doesn’t work on my 0.17.4 instance) true, but it doesn’t work when creating links elsewhere (say you want to link to Lemmy from a certain site starting with an ‘r’).

Usability-wise - absolutely agreed. I do wonder if it's possible to implement it on a technical level in a way that does not cripple smaller instances.

It would help if Lemmy would treat navigating to an unknown instance to searching for it.

I guess if it only affected the UI component and did not initiate the actual federation - maybe it could work.

Sure. TBH most end users are not going to care about federation and just want to see what a community is all about.