Link check to prevent double posts?

June 12, 2003 9:13 AM

Probably been mentioned before, but how hard would it be to link check on a post to ensure no double posting? You could even mock the poor soul!
posted by xmutex to Feature Requests at 9:13 AM (16 comments total)

it's in there, like prego.
the reason it wasn't caught with the triple cat dressup post is the first was to the japanese language page, the second to the english page and the third to the english page with an anchor name tag, i.e. #blabla. however, all three url's contain the term 'petoffice', which when used in search returns all three posts.
posted by quonsar at 9:36 AM on June 12, 2003

Would it be a lot of trouble for the link search to alert posters to "similar" pages - i.e. if it finds an FPP with the same root in the URL, but a different path at the end, it could say - "No Match was found - but you may want to check these threads, which go to a similar URL."

Of course, this wouldn't handle cases where the same content shows up on a site with a totally different domain name. But it'd be something, at least.
posted by soyjoy at 9:59 AM on June 12, 2003

No, I don't think it's in there (for MeFi, not MeTa). Or at least it seems not.

I posted a dupe URL the other day (to my shock and horror and the ridicule of my peers). I could have clicked Submit (or even on Preview) and the page could have said "Sorry, that URL was submittied on X date, click here." (Fark does this).
posted by xmutex at 10:47 AM on June 12, 2003

xmutex, MeFi does search past links for the URL you submitted, but it searches for identical links.

e.g.:

http://www.foo.com/ posted on June 1 would not show up if you linked to http://foo.com/ or http://www.foo.com/index.html because they are not exact matches. I am pretty sure that's what happened in your case.

It would be great if I wrote some AI that figured this all out, but it's beyond my programming skills.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 12:39 PM on June 12, 2003

foreach my $blogdex_url (@top_100_blogdex_urls) {
   if ($submitted_url eq $blogdex_url) {
      $repost++;
    }
}

posted by Shadowkeeper at 12:56 PM on June 12, 2003

I've suggested this before, but there would be a lot fewer double posts if the default Search time period were a year rather than a month.
posted by languagehat at 1:02 PM on June 12, 2003

languagehat-- definitely. had i thought to search in a year (i.e. looked at the option) i would not have committed such an egregious double posting.
posted by xmutex at 1:04 PM on June 12, 2003

fine, I'll change it. Done.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:26 PM on June 12, 2003

see, now the children are dancing and enjoying ice cream and we are all happy.
posted by xmutex at 1:33 PM on June 12, 2003

I got a pony! I got a pony!
*dances, spatters bystanders with ice cream*
posted by languagehat at 1:47 PM on June 12, 2003

*allows languagehat one full minute of happiness, then grabs the ice cream and runs like hell*
posted by iconomy at 1:57 PM on June 12, 2003

the reason it wasn't caught with the triple cat dressup post is, aside from quonsar's neat word-in-the-URL trick, that apparently someone didn't bother to run a few key words in Google on the search page. Cats in hats and cats in clothes both work fine. It's not foolproof but you'd think a combination of the two approaches would diminish the double posts.
posted by y2karl at 2:24 PM on June 12, 2003

*sticks foot out, trips iconomy, laughs as ice cream smushed in his face*
posted by billsaysthis at 5:44 PM on June 12, 2003

oh, so you're a tough guy who thinks it's funny to pick on girls, huh billsaysthis? Ms. iconomy is gonna put the voodoo on ya.
posted by madamjujujive at 6:01 PM on June 12, 2003

She won't like that - better run, billsaysthis!
posted by dg at 6:01 PM on June 12, 2003

grabs the ice cream and runs like hell

I was once chased around a petting zoo by a llama who wanted my strawberry ice cream cone. I was about 7 years old, and didn't think to just drop the cone and run.
posted by debralee at 5:49 AM on June 13, 2003