[seqfan] Re: Correcting Broken Links - Some Choices

[Neil Sloane]

Let me reply to PMH's message. He said: *[My answers in bold]*

I'm working on fixing some links in A139250.  .

Neil was good enough to lay out for me the basics of how to do this in the
OEIS, but I've run across a couple of questions that I don't have answers
for, not knowing the "personality" of OEIS well enough.


   - Old links can be accessed via the WayBack Machine, web.archive.org.
   But should we assume that OEIS users can use that for themselves, or
should
   we do that for them? * [Please do it for them, if you can! It is better
if we have the retrieved link there in the sequence, rather than leaving it
to the user to do the work.  And this way it only has to be done once ]*



   - I would guess that we shouldn't use any of the URL-shortening
services. [*Correct, that just adds*

*one more level of complexity, one more thing that will break sooner or
later]*


   - Culling - or just failing to update - links that seem to be of only
   marginal utility. *[Please don't do any culling]*

Obviously people can't be going around will'e nil'e judging referenced
items to be not good enough - but there's a cost to fixing broken links
(including whether people are inclined in general to fix them)

Here's the example at hand:

Thr set of references that I've been considering includes 4 pictures of a
classroom working on the toothpick problem.

eg:
http://web.archive.org/web/20171110234732/http://i2.wp.
com/boisemathcircles.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/IMG_0003.jpg
:



They're darling and all, but are they worth updating?  should they even
have been in there in the first place? *[ YES   I put those links there.
This was in connection with a project we were (and are) involved in to get
school teachers aware of the usefulness of the OEIS for teaching math in
schools. Those links are important.  You probably did not know about this
initiative, but there was a conference at Bamf in Canada a couple of years
ago involving teachers and OEIS folks. ]*


Best regards
Neil

Neil J. A. Sloane, President, OEIS Foundation.
11 South Adelaide Avenue, Highland Park, NJ 08904, USA.
Also Visiting Scientist, Math. Dept., Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ.
Phone: 732 828 6098; home page: http://NeilSloane.com
Email: njasloane at gmail.com


On Sat, Mar 3, 2018 at 6:43 AM, P. Michael Hutchins <pmh232 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I'm working on fixing some links in A139250.  .
>
> Neil was good enough to lay out for me the basics of how to do this in the
> OEIS, but I've run across a couple of questions that I don't have answers
> for, not knowing the "personality" of OEIS well enough.
>
>
>    - Old links can be accessed via the WayBack Machine, web.archive.org.
>    But should we assume that OEIS users can use that for themselves, or
> should
>    we do that for them?
>
>
>
>    - I would guess that we shouldn't use any of the URL-shortening
> services.
>
>
>
>    - Culling - or just failing to update - links that seem to be of only
>    marginal utility.
>
> Obviously people can't be going around will'e nil'e judging referenced
> items to be not good enough - but there's a cost to fixing broken links
> (including whether people are inclined in general to fix them)
>
> Here's the example at hand:
>
> Thr set of references that I've been considering includes 4 pictures of a
> classroom working on the toothpick problem.
>
> eg:
> http://web.archive.org/web/20171110234732/http://i2.wp.
> com/boisemathcircles.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/IMG_0003.jpg
> :
>
>
>
> They're darling and all, but are they worth updating?  should they even
> have been in there in the first place?
>
> I don't know.
>
> Sorry if I was too blunt.
>
> --
> Seqfan Mailing list - http://list.seqfan.eu/
>