Hi all,

I’ve been observing and participating in this community for about a week now. I’m liking it so far, but one thing I’m really missing is a way to link to other Lemmy content in a way that’s instance-aware.

For example, if I were to want to link to !risa@startrek.website, I’d link to https://startrek.website/c/risa. But then I’d end up at a Lemmy instance where I don’t have an account; I’d really prefer to be redirected to https://derp.foo/c/risa@startrek.website.

So here’s my proposal: create a central Lemmy redirection service where people can set their instance (in a cookie). The idea would be that people can link to, say, https://example.com/c/risa@startrek.website, and be ensured us lemmings end up on an instance where we can actually post.

Linking to posts and comments should ideally be part of this as well but whould involve a little more work.

  • Gemini@lemmy.cafeEnglish
    2·
    2 years ago

    Usability-wise - absolutely agreed. I do wonder if it’s possible to implement it on a technical level in a way that does not cripple smaller instances.

    • irdc@derp.fooOPEnglish
      1·
      2 years ago

      It would help if Lemmy would treat navigating to an unknown instance to searching for it.

      • Gemini@lemmy.cafeEnglish
        2·
        2 years ago

        I guess if it only affected the UI component and did not initiate the actual federation - maybe it could work.

        • irdc@derp.fooOPEnglish
          2·
          2 years ago

          Sure. TBH most end users are not going to care about federation and just want to see what a community is all about.