July 08, 2017 [Comment on this post \[42\]](https://www.hanselman.com/blog/urls-are-ui/comments#comments-start) Posted in ![image](https://images.hanselman.com/blog/Windows-Live-Writer/URLs-are-UI_CD4C/image_16e77c3b-0e10-4ac8-a1f4-98afc6364af1.png "image") What a great title. "URLs are UI." Pithy, clear, crisp. Very true. I've been saying it for years. Someone on Twitter said "this is the professional quote of 2017" because they agreed with it. Except [Jakob Nielsen said it in 1999](https://www.nngroup.com/articles/url-as-ui/). And Tim Berners-Lee said " [Cool URIs don't change](https://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/URI) " in 1998. So many folks spend time on their CSS and their UX/UI but still come up with URLs that are at best, comically long, and at worst, user hostile. ### Search Results that aren't GETs - Make it easy to share Even non-technical parent or partner things URLs are UI? How do I know? How many times has a relative emailed you something like this: **"Check out this house we found! https://www.somerealestatesite.com/ homes/for\_sale/ search\_results.asp"** That's not meant to tease non-technical relative! It's not their fault! The URL is the UI for them. It's totally reasonable for them to copy-paste from the box that represents *where they are* and give it to you so *you can go there too!* Make it a priority that your website supports shareable URLs. ### URLs that are easy to shorten - Can you easily shorten a URL? I love Stack Overflow's URLs. Here's an example: [https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380/scott-hanselman](https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380/scott-hanselman "https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380/scott-hanselman") The only thing that matters there is the 6380. Try it [https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380](https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380) or [https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380/fancy-pants](https://stackoverflow.com/users/6380/fancy-pants) also works. SO will even support this! [http://stackoverflow.com/u/6380](http://stackoverflow.com/u/6380). Genius. Why? **Because they decided it matters.** Here's another [https://stackoverflow.com/questions/701030/whats-the-significance-of-oct-12-1999](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/701030/whats-the-significance-of-oct-12-1999 "https://stackoverflow.com/questions/701030/whats-the-significance-of-oct-12-1999") again, the text after the ID doesn't matter. [https://stackoverflow.com/questions/701030/](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/701030/) This is a great model for URLs where you want a to use a unique ID but the text/title in the URL may change. I use this for my podcasts so [https://hanselminutes.com/587/brandon-bouier-on-the-defense-digital-service-and-deploying-code-in-a-war-zone](https://hanselminutes.com/587/brandon-bouier-on-the-defense-digital-service-and-deploying-code-in-a-war-zone "https://hanselminutes.com/587/brandon-bouier-on-the-defense-digital-service-and-deploying-code-in-a-war-zone") is the same as [https://hanselminutes.com/587](https://hanselminutes.com/587). ### Unnecessarily long or unintuitive URLs - Human Readable and Human Guessable Sometimes if you want context to be carried in the URL you have to, well, carry it along. There was [a little debate on Twitter recently](https://twitter.com/cschleiden/status/883197966600646656) about URLs like this [https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/\_projects](https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/_projects?WT.mc_id=-blog-scottha "https://fabrikam1.visualstudio.com/_projects"). What's wrong with it? The \_ is not intuitive at all. Why not [https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/projects](https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/projects?WT.mc_id=-blog-scottha "https://fabrikam1.visualstudio.com/_projects")? Because [obscure technical reason](https://twitter.com/cschleiden/status/883197966600646656). In fact, all the top level menu items for doing stuff in VSTS start with \_. Not /menu/ or /action or whatever. My code is [https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/\_git/FabrikamVSO](https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/_git/FabrikamVSO?WT.mc_id=-blog-scottha "https://fabrikam1.visualstudio.com/_git/FabrikamVSO") and I clone from here [https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/DefaultCollection/\_git/FabrikamVSO](https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/DefaultCollection/_git/FabrikamVSO?WT.mc_id=-blog-scottha). That's weird. Where did Default Collection come from? Why can't I just add a ".git" extension to my project's URL and clone that? Well, maybe they want the paths to be nice in the URL. Nope. [https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/\_git/FabrikamVSO?path=%2Fsrc%2Fsetup%2Fcleanup.local.ps1&version=GBmaster&\_a=contents](https://fabrikam.visualstudio.com/_git/FabrikamVSO?path=%2Fsrc%2Fsetup%2Fcleanup.local.ps1&version=GBmaster&_a=contents&WT.mc_id=-blog-scottha "https://fabrikam1.visualstudio.com/_git/FabrikamVSO?path=%2Fsrc%2Fsetup%2Fcleanup.local.ps1&version=GBmaster&_a=contents") is a file. Compare that to [https://github.com/shanselman/TinyOS/blob/master/readme.md](https://github.com/shanselman/TinyOS/blob/master/readme.md?WT.mc_id=-blog-scottha "https://github.com/shanselman/TinyOS/blob/master/readme.md") at GitHub. Again, I am sure there is a good, and perhaps very valid technical reason. But another valid reason is very frank. **URLs weren't a UX priority.** Same with OneDrive [https://onedrive.live.com/?id=CD0633A7367371152C%21172&cid=CD06A73371152C](https://onedrive.live.com/?id=CD0633A7367371152C%21172&cid=CD06A73371152C "https://onedrive.live.com/?id=CD0633A7367371152C%21172&cid=CD06A7367371152C") vs. DropBox [https://www.dropbox.com/home/Games](https://www.dropbox.com/home/Games "https://www.dropbox.com/home/Games") As a programmer, I am sympathetic. As a user, I have zero sympathy. Now I have to remember that there is a \_ and it's a thing. I proposed this. [URLs are rarely a tech problem They are an organizational willpower problem.](https://twitter.com/shanselman/status/883199162749026305) You care a lot about the evocative 2meg jpg hero image on your website. You change fonts, move CSS around ad infinitum, and agonize over single pixels. **You should also care about your URLs.** > **SIDE NOTE:** Yes, I am fully aware of my own hypocrisy with this issue. My blog software was written by a bunch of us in 2002 and our URLs are close to OK, but their age is showing. I need to find a balance between "Cool URLs don't change" and "should I change totally uncool URLs." Ideally I'd change my blog's URLs to be all lowercase, use hyphens for spaces instead of CamelCase, and I'd hide the technology. No need (other than 17 year old historical technical ones) to have.aspx or.php at the end of your URL. It's on my list. What is **your** advice, Dear Reader for good URLs? --- **Sponsor:** Check out **JetBrains Rider:** a [new cross-platform.NET IDE](http://hnsl.mn/2tZFXWR). Edit, refactor, test, build and debug ASP.NET,.NET Framework,.NET Core, or Unity applications. Learn more and get access to early builds!