broken links : Java Glossary

Introduction

Some of the are not really broken links, just links Xenu did not probe sufficiently cleverly to simulate a browser precisely. If you know the proper URL (Uniform Resource Locator) for any of these broken links, please let me know. This list was produced by Xenu which often does not tell you the page where the original link was. I have to do a linear search to find it.

I manage detecting and to some extent repairing broken links with a Java utility I wrote myself called BrokenLinks that I offer free, with source to the world.

Broken Links Sorted by Error Code

There are 22 links that have been broken for at least 5 days yet to be fixed. Last revised: 2017-03-20

Links to Leave As Is

The following links are known to be broken, but they are deliberately not being repaired for now.

There are 9 links marked to be left as is. Last revised: 2017-03-20

Links Presumed Good

Xenu claims the following links are broken, but they have been manually found to be good. They should be manually rechecked from time to time. The problem may be an unknown SSL certificate authority which needs to be OKed manually, (a missing/unknown/uninstalled certificate root authority) or it may be the website sends the data, but with not-found status.

There are 89 links marked as presumed good despite what Xenu says. Last revised: 2017-03-20

Insidious Broken Links

There are two kinds of insidious broken links.

1. A website goes out of business and speculator buys the domain and puts a parking website on it that dispenses ads/and or porn no matter what page you request. These look like good links to the spidering process.
2. A newspaper site that displays the current headlines whenever you ask for a deleted page. This looks like good link to the spidering process.

I use Xenu and a backend tool I wrote myself called Brokenlinks to find the broken links. Both these tools are free. You can use them to maintain your own website. My automated tools cannot detect all problems. Sometimes a link that used to point to something important now points to a parking website or some unrelated page. I use a tool I wrote myself called FindParked to detect them. If you find any link errors, please let me know. My tools don’t necessarily find everything.

Broken Links are a Mixed Blessing

One one hand, website links quietly go stale and it is labour-intensive and sometimes impossible to research replacements. It is an Orwellian world where the text you point links in your website can disappear or change to say something completely different without notification. I received furious email about my links pointing to porn sites. The original owners had gone belly up and speculators had bought the domain names and parked them with temporary porn sites.

Or the other hand, the chaos means I can point to anybody’s website without their permission and without any bureaucracy. I can change the content of my website any time I please, rename, retract, or delete without having to inform anyone or submit bureaucratic change requests. It leads to a much more fluid web.