http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query...::

The stuff I typed above is the same as what is shown below, where I inserted two spaces to avoid getting it mangled into a dysfunctional hyperlink:

http: //memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D? cdn:13:./temp/~ammem_9SAV::

However, since the gift was anonymous, I know not whom to thank, and therefore I post my expression of gratitude here in the hope that my benefactor will see it.

-

Also, I thank the organizers and successful contestants in the Holiday Present Hunt for providing me with yet another free session of ego-reduction therapy. :-S

<Happy New Year> to all.

For my family and many other people we know (and countless others we don't), 2013 was a difficult and in many ways a horrific year.

With completely unfounded optimism, I hope that 2014 will prove less daunting. May we achieve at last what we have set out to do, and may the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune sufficiently abate for us to survive the experience.

http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query...

I have déjà vu: we've just been over this. I think you know why this is happening, right? The URL mangling is semi-intentional.

People like to drop URLs into the middle of sentences, without always delineating them neatly with spaces, so we've set up special rules that interpret punctuation characters at the beginning and ends of URLs as being what the person was typing, and not the URL itself. This way, sentences of these type work:

• For chess news, I like to visit http://www.chessdom.com.

• Google's website (http://www.google.com) works differently from different parts of the world.

• http://www.twitter.com: it's not just about photographing food anymore.

It's that last example that is crossing you up here. The software sees those colons and figures you are typing a sentence in which a colon follows a URL as a sentence construct.

The problem from an ergonomics perspective works like this: the percentage of times you find a permanent URL which legitimately and necessarily has colons, commas, parentheses, periods, etc. at the *end* of the URL is well less than 1%. There's nothing that says you can't end a link like that, but people just tend to not do it. However, the number of times somebody screws up a link by shoving it next to something else is at least 10%. So to make things 100% "RFC 1738 Compliant" would have the consequence of seeing problematic URLs increase tenfold.

I haven't figured out, however, how to prevent interpretation of </a> embedded in an URL as embedded HTML ...

Maybe after the seasonal rush is over? ;p

<chessgames.com>: Whether I "deserve" the New Year's gift or not I don't know, but I am glad of it.

And like Annie said. Haters are gonna hate, and it's usually down to jealousy in my experience, because you have a good thing going here. I've been a member of most chess sites but I've learnt more from this site than any other and you don't even have to be a premium member for a lot of that information so Urcan has really annoyed me.

Of course the link itself appears to be temporary, but might work OK for a couple hours...>