[Bioc-devel] Short URLs for packages?

[Dan Tenenbaum]

----- Original Message -----
> From: "Robert Castelo" <robert.castelo at upf.edu>
> To: "Dan Tenenbaum" <dtenenba at fredhutch.org>
> Cc: bioc-devel at r-project.org
> Sent: Thursday, April 30, 2015 12:57:36 AM
> Subject: Re: [Bioc-devel] Short URLs for packages?
> 
> hi Dan,
> 
> one question about this, just to know whether this is intentional or
> should be fixed. i have noticed that these short URLs:
> 
> www.bioconductor.org/packages/BiocGenerics
> 
> or
> 
> bioconductor.org/packages/BiocGenerics
> 
> resolve to
> 
> http://master.bioconductor.org/packages/release/bioc/html/BiocGenerics.html
> 
> while the page is correct, should not they be resolving to an URL
> starting with 'www' instead of 'master'? i.e.,
> 
> www.bioconductor.org/packages/release/bioc/html/BiocGenerics.html
> 
> 
> this is really minor, but i think it may create confusion when one
> sees
> the same page starting with 'www' or 'master'.
> 

'www' is just an alias, typically any url starting with www should redirect to plain old bioconductor.org.
I've fixed the redirects so they no longer redirect to master. So 


 www.bioconductor.org/packages/BiocGenerics
 
 or
 
 bioconductor.org/packages/BiocGenerics
 
 resolves to
 
 http://bioconductor.org/packages/release/bioc/html/BiocGenerics.html

Dan


> 
> cheers,
> 
> robert.
> 
> On 04/28/2015 08:08 PM, Dan Tenenbaum wrote:
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> >> From: "Wolfgang Huber"<whuber at embl.de> To:
> >> bioc-devel at r-project.org Sent: Monday, March 23, 2015 3:17:03 AM
> >> Subject: [Bioc-devel] Short URLs for packages?
> >>
> >> I wonder whether it’d possible to have the website understand URLs
> >> like http://www.bioconductor.org/<pkgname>
> >>
> >> This could resolve to
> >> http://www.bioconductor.org/packages/release/bioc/html/<pkgname>.html
> >>
> >>
> or
> >> http://www.bioconductor.org/packages/devel/bioc/html/<pkgname>.html
> >>
> >>
> depending on whether the package was yet released.
> >>
> >> This could be handy in papers or grants that mention packages.
> >>
> >
> > We came up with something close to this, but it does include the
> > /packages/ segment because we think that's important.
> >
> >
> > http://bioconductor.org/packages/BiocGenerics/
> >
> > - takes you to the release landing page, unless the package is only
> > in devel, in which case it takes you to the devel landing page
> > (which
> > will contain suitable warnings/instructions about installing the
> > devel version).
> >
> > You can also specify 'devel' or 'release' or a numbered
> > Bioconductor
> > version:
> >
> > http://bioconductor.org/packages/devel/BiocGenerics/
> > http://bioconductor.org/packages/release/BiocGenerics/
> > http://bioconductor.org/packages/3.2/BiocGenerics/
> > http://bioconductor.org/packages/3.1/BiocGenerics/
> > http://bioconductor.org/packages/3.0/BiocGenerics/ ...
> >
> > (The trailing slashes are optional in all of these).
> >
> > These are redirects and not forwards; that is, if you enter one of
> > these short URLs, it won't remain in your browser's address bar but
> > will change to one of the longer URLs. So they are sort of
> > ephemeral
> > in this way.
> >
> > We looked into doing these as forwards (i.e., short URL remains in
> > address bar, but content from 'long' URL is served), which seems
> > more
> > useful, but there were too many problems with that; it breaks
> > relative URLs and more importantly it breaks our mirrors which do
> > not
> > necessarily have the same content root as our web site.
> >
> > At any rate, the short URLs can be used in publications and other
> > sites, and they are useful as a permanent link to the current
> > release
> > version of a package. We have added information about these short
> > URLs to the emails we send to new package developers, so that they
> > can use them in publications that reference their packages.
> >
> > Thanks, Dan
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> Wolfgang
> >>
> >>
> >> ---- Wolfgang Huber Principal Investigator, EMBL Senior Scientist
> >> Genome Biology Unit European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL)
> >> Heidelberg, Germany
> >>
> >> T +49-6221-3878823 wolfgang.huber at embl.de http://www.huber.embl.de
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Bioc-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> >> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/bioc-devel
> >>
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Bioc-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/bioc-devel
> 
> --
> Robert Castelo, PhD
> Associate Professor
> Dept. of Experimental and Health Sciences
> Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF)
> Barcelona Biomedical Research Park (PRBB)
> Dr Aiguader 88
> E-08003 Barcelona, Spain
> telf: +34.933.160.514
> fax: +34.933.160.550
>