Improve Article Linking

Feature Upgrade · Articles & templates · Created by 111ragnarok
closed

What functionality is missing? What is unsatisfying with the current situation?

  In a world with many articles, the current text link features using the @ symbol make it difficult to find articles. In some cases, duplicate article names are difficult to sort out. To solve this, I suggest 3 improvments:  

Category Paths in Article Suggestions

When listing article suggestions, include the articles category path below the article name in a "subtext" type formatting.   Example:

Article 1 Title
Parent Category/Child Category
Article 2 Title
Parent Category
 

Filter Suggestions By Article Type

Adding the ability to filter articles while using textual links would improve the feature greatly. This could be done by putting the article type directly after the @ symbol and placing a ":" before the article name.   Examples:   @person:bob
@landmark:ale house   Also, please add a way to use @ directly in text. "noparse" works, but it really messes with syntax highlighting.  

Search Articles When Creating References

Sometimes, an article title is not enough. Being able to search by content and other elements would be great. This could be implemented with a syntax like "@search:dagger" or "@s:elf".  

How does this feature request address the current situation?

  Creating article references would be much simpler.  

What are other uses for this feature request?

  Using the @directive:parameter format, text linking could become a powerful feature. It could be used for macros too at some point.

Follow up


The "directive:parameter" sytax would only be for searching. Once an article is selected, it would use the normal syntax. Just to be clear, the new syntax would just be a helper to lookup an article.

The Team's Response

Thanks for the suggestions! In the future, please only suggest one feature per suggestion. Due to the formatting of this suggestion, we have no way of knowing the specific priorities of the community (which is the main purpose of this system). Therefore, we can't accept this as a whole due to the low amount of support spread over multiple suggestions. That said, we're looking at ways to improve the search system, which is what drives the mention system suggestions too.
Current score

23/300 Votes · +3105 points

Votes Cast

  • +300

    by phre3d
    on 2024-06-17 19:37
    Since the recommendations only affect search/selection and not the link itself I'm all in favour.
  • +1

    by LittleSister
    on 2024-06-16 14:37
  • +1

    by twirlingfox
    on 2024-06-15 18:35
  • +100

    by morganarcher
    on 2024-06-13 01:48
  • +1

    by Those2Nerds
    on 2024-06-06 15:09
    I'm not entirely clear what this is resolving that isn't already resolvable. The mention system and autolinker both refer to article template when suggesting articles. The mention system searches tags, and ctrl+k searches everything with one-click options to copy inline and block links.   I still support ways to make existing systems more flexible, however. Particularly since this doesn't sound like it would interfere with current functioning.
  • +100

    by Michael Chandra
    on 2024-06-06 14:20
  • +1

    by fortresshowardwrite
    on 2024-06-05 17:54
  • +300

    by SoulLink
    on 2024-06-05 06:29
  • +300

    by DesNordlund
    on 2024-06-03 08:28
    I can's see how the visual aid should affect the links in any way, as some below fears. The link has only the article's id in it. And it is not always visually attractive to make a clonky headline for the article just to keep it apart from another when searching. You could though go the article and copy its link from there, so there is a workaround, though quite much clicking back and forth. If this could be done without slowing things down too much, go for it, please.
  • +100

    by ss2020
    on 2024-06-02 21:45
    I think it would be better to see the article's subheading.
  • +300

    by Valraven Dreadwood
    on 2024-06-01 20:00
    This is an excellent idea and recommendation!! I have 800+ articles in my world, and I've been having a hard time linking articles where they need to go. This improvement would make things infinitely easier for me and others in a similar situation.
  • +300

    by Hack-N-Slash
    on 2024-05-31 14:22
  • -100

    by WeStanNikolai
    on 2024-05-31 13:11
  • -100

    by norselyqueer
    on 2024-05-30 13:31
    I think the current system works just fine if you properly format your article titles, and I share Gaëlle's concern that changing the syntax will undo the current links.
  • +100

    by Gaëlle S.
    on 2024-05-30 12:20
    This is a very good idea in my opinion but the problem is if they change the syntax for links, won't we need to relink every article again? I'm not too sure but if that's the case, the first suggestion would be the best.
  • +100

    by A Thundering Cthulhu
    on 2024-05-30 09:57
  • +100

    by Jupiter Melichios
    on 2024-05-29 22:52
  • +300

    by PhntmDrgn
    on 2024-05-29 21:15
  • +100

    by JoellaKay
    on 2024-05-29 20:37
  • +300

    by [email protected]
    on 2024-05-29 16:00
    It seems that we're both on the same page about similar terms getting picked up by the Autolinker (see my suggestion). This option would work as well, so you've got my vote!
  • +100

    by tjtrewin
    on 2024-05-29 13:28
  • +100

    by DMFW
    on 2024-05-29 11:07
    The issue of identifying the right article when one or more articles share a title is also mitigated if the name and title of an article are separated into two concepts, allowing names to be distinct and thus more useful for searching and referencing. You might like to consider my open suggestion for this, if you haven't already...
  • +1

    by liviajelliot
    on 2024-05-29 08:28
  • +300

    by 111ragnarok
    on 2024-05-29 03:35