Automagic word linking

  • Thread starter Thread starter LoudMusic
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LoudMusic

LoudMusic

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Ok, this is going to be a bit to follow, so try to keep up.

The guys at Penny Arcade have been pretty active subscribers to a web design method I like to call 'word linking'. In their text they link words to a website about the word. IE "MechAssault" links to http://www.mechassault.com . I too attempt to use this style in the things that I do. Instead of typing a paragraph and then citing a bunch of address afterward, it makes for a much cleaner presentation.

For certain things this can be done automatically. I was reading a thread that referanced SSR11. Wouldn't it be cool if the site could search text for certain words and replace them with linked words to a description of the word? Example: "I just did 20 laps on Complex String. It was TOUGH!" would be changed to "I just did 20 laps on Complex String. It was TOUGH!"

This could be done with cars, tracks, different kinds of information ... whatever we think would be cool really. I imagine it would get old keying in all the find and replace things, but it'd sure be cool to have it all done up.
 
Great idea!

It certainly would be difficult to implement though, and especially via vBulletin... I'm assuming it would require that Jordan manually add in what words would link up to which pages, correct? Also, there's the issue of someone misspelling a word. Anyway, that would be a great idea for a piece of software too :thumbsup:, assuming that it hasn't already been made. ;)
 
I think it's quite easy to implement, just like the swear filter. Replace the words that should be linked with the proper vB tags, and voilá.
 
But the research would be time consuming, wouldn't it? (I'm assuming that LM didn't just want tracks, but others too...)
 
I don't think it would be a matter of research, words could be suggested and an "automatic link database" could be built-up gradually. Compare it to the smilie database, which has expanded greatly over the last year.
 
It's a good idea, but all this stuff requires that the server search through the text every time it's displayed. It all adds work on the server-side, which may cause a site slowdown. I know that Jordan has a dedicated server, the only question is whether it's powerful enough...
 
Originally posted by GilesGuthrie
It's a good idea, but all this stuff requires that the server search through the text every time it's displayed. It all adds work on the server-side, which may cause a site slowdown. I know that Jordan has a dedicated server, the only question is whether it's powerful enough...
Click to expand...

Well, it's already doing essentially the same thing for the foul language checker and the http:// linker. It would just be adding a bunch more links.

One other cool thing it could do is link members' names in the text. Surely there's a faster way of doing that than keying in everyones' name.
 
Although it might appear that there is a simple way to do this using the swear filter and vB code, there isn't. The swear filter replaces each character in a word with a specified character (in our case, *) - it isn't a unique specified replacement for each individual word. vB code is set up in a similar way, that requires it to look for an opening and closing tag with different parameters that are specified by the user. In short, all of the new coding that would be required, along with the tedious task of entering all the information in (while taking a stream of yet more new suggestions) is a time-consuming can of worms I would rather leave closed.
 

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