# Why won't this site parse correctly? OR The amazing, invisible url! **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [August 3, 2002, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116 "2002-08-03T02:02:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/1 "2002-08-03T02:02:12Z")
[http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B"baby+carrots"&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) If you hold your mouse pointer over the url you can see that a huge chunk of it’s invisible. But it gets you to the right location (a Google-cached article about baby carrots) vB also insista on sticking {url} tags throughout the url. Somethin’ wacky’s goin’ on. Fenris ---
**Author:** ![reprise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ea666f/32.png) [@reprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/reprise)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/2 "2002-08-03T02:07:58Z")
[[www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B"baby+carrots"&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)"]test]([http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:)[url) ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/3 "2002-08-03T02:25:30Z")
Now, unless I’m mistaken, the URL you want to link to is this: [http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com) /recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8 I put a line-break in there so that it would fit on one page. The problem, of course, is that there is another URL contained in the URL. Specifically: [www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html](http://www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html) If you have Auto-parse URLs selected, then the software will try to parse this URL as well as the compelete URL, making everything muck up. I don’t know if there’s a way to fix it so that it won’t do that. However, you should be able to make a link that works, like this: [Test Numero Dos](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) I have Auto-parse URLs turned off for this post, but I don’t know if that’s necessary. ---
**Author:** ![reprise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ea666f/32.png) [@reprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/reprise)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/4 "2002-08-03T02:42:05Z")
**Fenris** , clicking on your link didn’t get me to the article - just to a google page saying that it couldn’t find anything. When I copied the link address into my browser and edited out , it worked just fine and took me to the article. My guess is that shouldn’t have been in the address in the first place. When I try to post the revised url (ie, with ONLY the removed), I get THIS on preview : [www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/](http://www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/) 25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8" target="\_blank"\>should work fine now I have no idea whatsoever how the the HTML command “target=”\_blank"\> is getting inserted in there . Very weird. I’ve tried cut and pasting “to link to this page” url directly from the cached page, and it still adds the HTML command in for some reason. ---
**Author:** ![Berkut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a88e57/32.png) [@Berkut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Berkut)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/5 "2002-08-03T03:29:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by reprise \* > **I have no idea whatsoever how the the HTML command “target=”\_blank"\> is getting inserted in there . Very weird.** Its VB adding that command to get it to open in a new window. I don’t get what the problem was in the OP. I don’t see any parts of the URL missing. [http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B"baby+carrots"&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/6 "2002-08-03T04:54:09Z")
Fenris, what browser are you using? My Netscape shows the whole url in the preview at the bottom of the page when I hold the cursor over the link. It’s version 4.6 I think. ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/7 "2002-08-03T05:06:24Z")
The URL is such a mishmash of punctuation marks and quantifiers that it’s difficult to tell whether what you’re looking at is the real thing. When you click on it, does it actually bring up the baby carrots article? For me (Netscape 7 and IE 6), my link is the only one that works. ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/8 "2002-08-03T11:05:28Z")
A) The URL _DID_ work in preview, but doesn’t work now. B) I’m using IE 5.5 C) Ever clicked on one of those “Google Cached Thread” links? That’s what the URL was. Fenris ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/9 "2002-08-03T17:33:25Z")
[http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache%3Awl3JO-WFKJYC%3Awww.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B"baby+carrots"&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache%3Awl3JO-WFKJYC%3Awww.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/10 "2002-08-03T17:50:50Z")
[The truth about baby carrots](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/11 "2002-08-03T17:56:40Z")
It looks like vBulletin was confused by the “:www” in your link and added an extra in there. To get the link to work successfully, you could do either of the following: Include the link as is, but replace the “:” with “%3A”, which is what I did in my first post. Leave a check in the “Automatically parse URLs” box. In this post I purposely **un** checked the box so you could see the full text of the URL that would be correctly parsed by vBulletin. [http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache%3Awl3JO-WFKJYC%3Awww.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B"baby+carrots"&hl=en&ie=UTF-8](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache%3Awl3JO-WFKJYC%3Awww.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) Method 2: as Achernar did, surround the url with the standard [My description](http://...) If you use this method, make sure that the “Automatically parse URLs” box is **not** checked to prevent vBulletin from inserting an extra where the “:www” appears in your link. That’s what I did in my second post: [The truth about baby carrots](http://216.239.39.100/search?q=cache:wl3JO-WFKJYC:www.bouldernews.com/recreation/ecology/25gcol.html+%2B%22baby+carrots%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2002, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-this-site-parse-correctly-or-the-amazing-invisible-url/122116/12 "2002-08-03T20:14:04Z")
:: worships **Arnold** for his vast knowledge of vB :: Thanks!!