Context: I was trying to find how to list backlinks for a page with a RedirectClass xobject and couldn’t (hint: it’s possible to hack it using the edit action but it’s not nice).
So here’s a proposal of how it could be implemented in the future:
When you land on a page you have been redirected to from another page with a RedirectClass xobject, display somewhere a message indicating that you’ve been redirected. TODO: Decide where we display that information. This is Loading...
Implement Loading... to have a technical way to view a page with a redirection and not get redirected.
In the message mentioned above, provide a link to the page that you’ve been redirected from and use Loading... so that the user can click it and not be redirected.
The user is then able to be on the page with the redirection and use all the Menu actions to perform the actions he needs: delete the page, edit it, see backlinks, children, etc.
Just to be sure, are we talking only about automatic redirections or backlinks in general?
Because in the Knowledge Management space there’s the concept of backlinks of any page that has a link to the current page in its content. Linking “one to many”, in opposition of simple redirects which is “one to one".
So if Page B is linked in the contents of Page A, C and D the backlinks in Page B should show Page A, C and D as well.
Would an XNotification work? It’s the same component as the one used for the Save alerts for example. This info does not need to be on the page for a long time so I think it’d fit.
From XWIKI-13185: This is needed because there doesn't seem to be any other way to see these "pages" that are only redirect to other documents. If we provide such a way to see the pages, this issue would be solved too
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This plan sounds good to me There’s both a roundabout way to do things for non technical users (go to the redirect target then back) and a shorter solution for advanced users (URL parameter). I thought a bit about a user parameter or a shortcut to toggle redirects, but as long as there’s no users asking for it, it’s too much. We could add it later if the need arises.
For complex cases with chained redirects, editing everything would still be a bit difficult, but enough back and forth it’d still work.
Do you have an estimated priority or a timeframe for when you’d like to be done with it? Maybe it can be an item for the 18.x roadmap or something we tackle on XWiki Days?
Maybe, but IMO it’s too transient (and it really disappears too fast), I’d expect the information to last (at least until your discard it).
I don’t think so. For me this issue is still valid:
As an administrator of the wiki, I want to be able to see all the redirections that exist on the wiki and be able to clean them up,
So we still need a UI to display all redirects of your wiki.
Nothing planned on my side. But I think this is something we miss for usability, so I’d be in favor of trying to fit this in as soon as we can. IMO it could be an idea for your work on improving usability in the future. Now, we also need to improve usability of onboarding…
In that case IMO a simple link, like Wikipedia does it, would be good. Below the “last modified by” line is an interesting spot because it is the user’s sight when landing on the page (contrary than on the bottom of the document for example). It’s simple and elegant.
I hadn’t thought about this location and I like it. I see 3 advantages:
It’s located with other second-level page metadata
It’s not transient
It’s not impacting the visual aspect of the page and that’s very important as we’ll always have users who will ask to not see the info all the time. Since it’s not an action you need to see all the time, it’s very fine to be a bit “hidden” in the information tab.
Wouldn’t this info be too hidden from the user? Would there be a way for me, as a user, to know that I’ve been redirected without going to the info tab?
Would you have a need as a standard user to know that? I mean usually when we want the info and the link it’s because we already know what we’re looking for, I’m not sure that we have currently a real usecase for advertising standard users about those redirects.
On some scenarios, this info will be useful as a reassurance to the user. Imagine that, as a user, I click on a page called “Engineering Best Practices" but land on a page and url named “Our Best Practices" that’s a potential point of confusion (Did I land on the correct page or not, should I try again for the exact title?). I guess this is why Wikipedia shows this info right below the title, so it reassures the user that a redirection has taken place.
I’m more with @surli . Redirects in our case are moved pages. And not the page itself is renamed but it’s somewhere moved to another space.
If we search for a page the former page path would not be visible. If we link inside articles we nearly never write the path in the link name but use something more or less like the title. We adapt the title in a way that the sentence makes sense.
If wikipedia would provide me “transportation” as a search result while I did search “transport” I would be fine. Instead it shows me instantly the article “transportation” when I search “transport” and hit enter. So it routed me but did not ask. That’s not the case in XWiki. I get what I see in quick search or search results.
I would like a link to “view” redirecting pages in the information tab.
There’s both a roundabout way to do things for non technical users (go to the redirect target then back) and a shorter solution for advanced users (URL parameter). I thought a bit about a user parameter or a shortcut to toggle redirects, but as long as there’s no users asking for it, it’s too much. We could add it later if the need arises.