Duplicate Vanity / Custom simple URL for members. Ex: http://yourforum.com/[username]

[elsparkodiablo]

This is a repost of a suggestion that has been made a couple times over the years - per the Guide to Suggestions there hasn't been activity on either for half a decade, so I'm creating this thread.

Our forum is populated by a great number of non 'tech savvy' individuals, particularly craftsmen who often do not have their own website, but definitely have facebook / twitter / instagram & other social media. As a result, you'll see their business cards have their social media links:

Joe Blow Knifemaker

Facebook.com/JoeblowKnives
Instagram.com/JoeBlowKnifeGuy
Twitter: @JoeBlowKnife

Xenforo lacking the ability for a simplified custom "vanity" URL for members is something that should have been implemented long ago. We want to encourage our users to stay within the community, and build our communities further, so why not make it easier for community personalities to draw their userbase to our sites?

http://yourforumname.com/index.php?members/Joeblowknives.1234567

should be

http://yourforumname.com/Joeblowknives

Simplified URLs increase sharing that information via emails, twitter profile, facebook and more - the more complicated the URL is, the less likely people are to directly enter it, and the greater the likelihood that errors will occur.

If implemented, please allow options to limit this feature by usergroup.

 

[Mouth]

Good idea, except I see too much complication/conflict when you have pages or add-ons already using that URL route, or wanting to use it.

Eg. What if you want to create a page (or already have a page) with URL /Joeblowknives

 

[elsparkodiablo]

The software already has the ability to prevent duplicate user names, I'm not sure how preventing duplicate URLs is impossible.

 

[Mike Edge]

https://xenforo.com/community/resources/vanity-names.2720/ does this already

As you can see a few examples
https://www.pucksters.com/pucksters/

https://www.pucksters.com/emtziggy4445/

https://www.pucksters.com/some-hockey-chick/

https://www.pucksters.com/mike/

I had to also use @xfrocks redirect addon to redirect /members/username to just /username and some custom coding to remove the userID number after the username on the redirect.

 

[elsparkodiablo]

https://xenforo.com/community/resources/vanity-names.2720/ does this already
https://www.pucksters.com/pucksters/

https://www.pucksters.com/pucksters/
Unmaintained, unsupported, and this should be core functionality in a world where we should strive to give our users ways to recruit more members.

I had to also use @xfrocks redirect addon to redirect /members/username to just /username and some custom coding to remove the userID number after the username on the redirect.

So you had to use an addon, another addon, and custom coding to create something that does this?

 

[Mike Edge]

So you had to use an addon, another addon, and custom coding to create something that does this?

Correct, since it not part of core. I'm fine with it though as it works exactly as I want it too.

 

[elsparkodiablo]

Clearly you see this as a value added feature though, correct? Otherwise you wouldn't have jumped through as many hoops.

 

[Mike Edge]

Clearly you see this as a value added feature though, correct? Otherwise you wouldn't have jumped through as many hoops.

Since I'm building my site to compete with Facebook hockey groups next season, yes I sure do. That is also why I have member cards to auto hover rather then required to click the username, just like they auto on FB. My beta users are basically recommending features that duplicate Facebook, as for many, it is all they know.

On the flip side of the coin, most forums aren't trying to duplicate a social media platform, so it is debatable is it's valuable for core by the masses of forum owners.

 

[elsparkodiablo]

We can't duplicate social media platforms, forums and social media serve two different purposes. Despite the differences in purpose, there's shared commonality in many aspects and there's little to no reason not to have similar feature sets that only serve to enhance usability & encourage customer interaction and growth.

Put it another way: what are the downsides of implementing this?

The upsides are obvious

 

[Mike Edge]

I agree with you, it's just getting the masses to.

 

[elsparkodiablo]

Like the first post, my guy. Likes are how suggestions are noticed.

 

[Mike Edge]

Like the first post, my guy. Likes are how suggestions are noticed.

oh? sorry I'm new here

 

[xenfans]

Fingers crossed nobody signs up with names like cpanel, mail, and other url tricks for managed vps and shared hosting forums.

 

[Mouth]

why I have member cards to auto hover rather then required to click the username

How have you achieved this?

 

[elsparkodiablo]

Fingers crossed nobody signs up with names like cpanel, mail, and other url tricks for managed vps and shared hosting forums.

The list of forbidden URL alias grows slightly longer!

 

[xenfans]

The list of forbidden URL alias grows slightly longer!

I can imagine, it's the same stuff for domains as for emails, giving vanity emails like "username: billing" allowing someone to take over billing@example.com, etc. same for example.com/billiing or paypal.example.com, etc. if there are scripts with defaults, for some it's worth to take these default usernames trying to get those domains etc to work for eh. those purposes. Not to mention cron, log www-data, root, postmaster (handy for force takeover domain transfers), etc.

 

[erich37]

this has been suggested already:

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/change-url-of-profile-page.113591/

Good idea, except I see too much complication/conflict when you have pages or add-ons already using that URL route, or wanting to use it.

Eg. What if you want to create a page (or already have a page) with URL /Joeblowknives

there is no issue, when it is done like this:

https://domain.com/@kier

https://domain.com/@brogan

 

[Paul B]

This appears to be the same or very similar suggestions as this: https://xenforo.com/community/threa...cess-member-profiles-via-user-name-only.4550/

So I will mark this as a duplicate.