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Somewhat related question that I'm interested in knowing people's thoughts on... If you have a website that contains user generated content aimed at technical

Somewhat related question that I'm interested in knowing people's thoughts on... If you have a website that contains user generated content aimed at technical folks what looks nicer (and maybe what are some more options?): 1. GitHub's implicit username: https://github.com/foo https://github.com/foo 2. Medium's @username: https://medium.com/@foo https://medium.com/@foo 3. Old style homedir (eg tildeverse): http://tilde.club/~foo http://tilde.club/~foo 4. Explicit user folder: https://example.com/users/foo https://example.com/users/foo My preference is not to use implicit usernames since you then would need to filter against a blocklist (something like https://github.com/marteinn/The-Big-Username-Blocklist https://github.com/marteinn/The-Big-Username-Blocklist). Anybody have any opinions?

bennyp101 5y ago
I don't know why, but personally I always associate old school style ~/ as more ... trust worthy? I don't know why though! Perhaps because I remember having those kind of addresses when I younger, and therefore associate with an older generation? (Not that that guarantees trustworthiness!) Or maybe because a lot of academic personal sites use that as well? I guess in terms of "what looks nicer", for me: 1. I assume this is just a directory 2. '@' in URLs just feels weird now, it's not a usename:password type thing 3. Not particularly pretty 4. I think that signifies what it is, and who it is
nemetroid 5y ago
Tildes are painful to type on several non-English layouts (e.g. Swedish). I like their Unixy vibe but disdain having to type them.
- marginalia_nu 5y ago
  Hmm, I use both Swedish and English layouts and I'd say they're about as painful to type on both. It's almost the exact same movement, except with the other hand.
  - nemetroid 5y ago
    Really? Tilde is a dead key on a typical Swedish keyboard, meaning that you have to type AltGr+~ followed by space. Technically, the space is not needed for letters that ~ doesn't compose with, but having to think about that is part of the pain. I also can't agree that it's almost the same hand movement, you have to use your right thumb for AltGr while also reaching for the key with your right hand. On an English layout you'd use your pinky for shift, or even your other hand.
    - marginalia_nu 5y ago
      You've already got your thumb by space after hitting ~. Pretty natural to just tap it. Swedish QWERTY has a lot of awkward symbols, but ~ isn't anywhere near the same class as something like {
      - nemetroid 5y ago
        Sure, {[]} are in their own league. But ~ is still very different, in a negative way, on the Swedish layout compared to an English layout.
- sph 5y ago
  And tildes don't exist al all on some keyboards. I remember memorising Alt+126 to enter a tilde on Windows with an Italian keyboard.
m-i-l 5y ago
Personally I'd prefer example.com/users/foo, or even example.com/u/foo, because (i) you don't need unusual characters like @ or ~, and (ii) you don't need server config to look for a wildcard in the root. Alternatively, if as you say it is for hosting "user generated content aimed at technical folks", users might want to feel like they own their own (sub-)domain, so how about foo.example.com instead?
kingcharles 5y ago
Personal preference is @username I have all the content off the root and I don't want a collision between /articlename and a user with that same name. ~ just makes me feel too old-school. And of course @ is used everywhere to indicate a username now.
- ramses0 5y ago
  Many people don't know how to even type `~`. `@` is becoming synonymous with "person".
  - tata71 5y ago
    "entity"
camgunz 5y ago
I mean, FWIW ~camgunz "expands" to /home/camgunzcamgunz (or /home/camgunz/camgunz), so it's a little incorrect? It's like "pixel graphic" games now that aim more for nostalgia than accuracy: Genesis games don't look like modern pixel graphic games, ~camgunz isn't actually how it works, etc. So I guess I prefer @camgunz for non-URLs, but blah://dir/camgunz for URLs?
- PureParadigm 5y ago
  Actually, it is how it works. Try doing "cd ~camgunz" and it should take you to the home directory for camgunz.
  - camgunz 5y ago
    WOW I had no idea! Why does this work haha EDIT: Oh I guess yeah, for other users. Innnnnnteresting, and then ~ is just shorthand for you. Huh.
- detaro 5y ago
  > FWIW ~camgunz "expands" to /home/camgunzcamgunz (or /home/camgunz/camgunz) It doesn't. ~user looks up the home directory of "user".
bullen 5y ago
I would prefer http://foo.binarytask.com http://foo.binarytask.com but that works best if you have you own custom DNS software.
marcosdumay 5y ago
Your #1 is full of problems about users not being capable of using their names or taking over system pages. So, whatever you do, avoid it, it's a bad one. The `@` has a special meaning in URLs, but I think all browsers are smart enough to not break on it.
- layer8 5y ago
  The `@` has no special meaning in the path part of a URL. https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc3986#section-3.3 https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc3986#section-3.3
Shared404 5y ago
I prefer ~, but that's probably mostly because I've found the sites that use it to align better with my personal philosophies (see: Sourcehut, most of the tildeverse, a lot of academic pages).

bennyp101 5y ago

I don't know why, but personally I always associate old school style ~/ as more ... trust worthy? I don't know why though! Perhaps because I remember having those kind of addresses when I younger, and therefore associate with an older generation? (Not that that guarantees trustworthiness!) Or maybe because a lot of academic personal sites use that as well? I guess in terms of "what looks nicer", for me: 1. I assume this is just a directory 2. '@' in URLs just feels weird now, it's not a usename:password type thing 3. Not particularly pretty 4. I think that signifies what it is, and who it is

nemetroid 5y ago

Tildes are painful to type on several non-English layouts (e.g. Swedish). I like their Unixy vibe but disdain having to type them.

marginalia_nu 5y ago
Hmm, I use both Swedish and English layouts and I'd say they're about as painful to type on both. It's almost the exact same movement, except with the other hand.
- nemetroid 5y ago
  Really? Tilde is a dead key on a typical Swedish keyboard, meaning that you have to type AltGr+~ followed by space. Technically, the space is not needed for letters that ~ doesn't compose with, but having to think about that is part of the pain. I also can't agree that it's almost the same hand movement, you have to use your right thumb for AltGr while also reaching for the key with your right hand. On an English layout you'd use your pinky for shift, or even your other hand.
  - marginalia_nu 5y ago
    You've already got your thumb by space after hitting ~. Pretty natural to just tap it. Swedish QWERTY has a lot of awkward symbols, but ~ isn't anywhere near the same class as something like {
    - nemetroid 5y ago
      Sure, {[]} are in their own league. But ~ is still very different, in a negative way, on the Swedish layout compared to an English layout.
sph 5y ago
And tildes don't exist al all on some keyboards. I remember memorising Alt+126 to enter a tilde on Windows with an Italian keyboard.

m-i-l 5y ago

Personally I'd prefer example.com/users/foo, or even example.com/u/foo, because (i) you don't need unusual characters like @ or ~, and (ii) you don't need server config to look for a wildcard in the root. Alternatively, if as you say it is for hosting "user generated content aimed at technical folks", users might want to feel like they own their own (sub-)domain, so how about foo.example.com instead?

kingcharles 5y ago

Personal preference is @username I have all the content off the root and I don't want a collision between /articlename and a user with that same name. ~ just makes me feel too old-school. And of course @ is used everywhere to indicate a username now.

ramses0 5y ago
Many people don't know how to even type `~`. `@` is becoming synonymous with "person".
- tata71 5y ago
  "entity"

camgunz 5y ago

I mean, FWIW ~camgunz "expands" to /home/camgunzcamgunz (or /home/camgunz/camgunz), so it's a little incorrect? It's like "pixel graphic" games now that aim more for nostalgia than accuracy: Genesis games don't look like modern pixel graphic games, ~camgunz isn't actually how it works, etc. So I guess I prefer @camgunz for non-URLs, but blah://dir/camgunz for URLs?

PureParadigm 5y ago
Actually, it is how it works. Try doing "cd ~camgunz" and it should take you to the home directory for camgunz.
- camgunz 5y ago
  WOW I had no idea! Why does this work haha EDIT: Oh I guess yeah, for other users. Innnnnnteresting, and then ~ is just shorthand for you. Huh.
detaro 5y ago
> FWIW ~camgunz "expands" to /home/camgunzcamgunz (or /home/camgunz/camgunz) It doesn't. ~user looks up the home directory of "user".

bullen 5y ago

I would prefer http://foo.binarytask.com http://foo.binarytask.com but that works best if you have you own custom DNS software.

marcosdumay 5y ago

Your #1 is full of problems about users not being capable of using their names or taking over system pages. So, whatever you do, avoid it, it's a bad one. The `@` has a special meaning in URLs, but I think all browsers are smart enough to not break on it.

layer8 5y ago
The `@` has no special meaning in the path part of a URL. https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc3986#section-3.3 https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc3986#section-3.3

Shared404 5y ago

I prefer ~, but that's probably mostly because I've found the sites that use it to align better with my personal philosophies (see: Sourcehut, most of the tildeverse, a lot of academic pages).