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I've said it before, but: What's the deal with 404 pages? If the content has moved, I should get a 30x redirect. If the server has a way of guessing what I wan
by Cushman 14y ago
I've said it before, but: What's the deal with 404 pages?
If the content has moved, I should get a 30x redirect. If the server has a way of guessing what I wanted, I should get 300 Multiple Choices. If the server knows that what I'm looking for isn't anywhere, I should get 410 Gone. 404 is supposed to mean that the server has no idea what I'm looking for, no idea how to find it, no idea where to look.
In that case, I don't want a page to load. I don't want a tab to open. I definitely don't want to download a Flash game, or a 500kb JPEG, or infinity many Lemming images. I just want my browser to mark that link as dead and let me know in as unobtrusive a way as possible, "Hey, you clicked on some bullshit!" Let me either search the domain or click something else.
Not to rag on creative 404s, and I know it's a bit of a pipe dream. Just a peeve of mine.
- watty 14y agoWell I do think that "404" should be more visible but everything else is just part of design. It's like complaining that blogs should be just text or that CSS3 is pointless. It's design, it's interesting, I like it.
- TheZenPsycho 14y agoif you feel the point of "design" is simply to make something look pretty, or interesting, then you missed the point.
- philip1209 14y agoI use Cloudflare's 404 pages feature, which incorporates possible intended destinations. I haven't had a chance to make a custom 404 page (e.g. with Google's 404 widget), so this gets the job done. e.g. http://www.philipithomas.com/does_not_exist http://www.philipithomas.com/does_not_exist
- cypher543 14y agoIs that page customizable in any way? My first impression is that it looks like a parked domain landing page, which I instinctively ignore and close immediately.
- tripzilch 14y agoYou're heartless, those poor lemmings were plummeting to their deaths!
- joetech 14y agoWhat it boils down to is that 403, 404, 500, etc. pages are there to identify a problem loading the resource you're after. In the case of a 500, I might agree, but with the 404, you're getting what it's supposed to give you, and that's a heads up that the url you were shooting for was not found. Some companies get creative while others create useful links and guesses, but either way, you got the intended message, "not found".