dan

We do have a community wiki about what duplicate content is, but it's for very general questions so the community doesn't keep providing different answers to that. More specific questions wouldn't be marked as a duplicate of that however.

@starball Thanks for the suggestion. We generally don't close questions as duplicates unless they're essentially asking the same thing, or the community decided on Meta that there should be a general community wiki to handle them. In this case, although these questions are all related to duplicate content, they're asking about different things related to that.

Hey @MikeCiffone that certainly looks reasonable, but it's always best to propose changes, even small ones, as a question on Meta so the community can chime in (and as a matter of record). Thanks!

@MartinSleziak Thanks for editing these tag-wikis on our site too.

If you're unsure of which to use, then you might consider asking over at Software Recommendations. You can always ask in their chat rooms first like you did here, which I'd really recommend for Software Recommendations because they're relatively picky when it comes to what they consider on-topic there.

@Sabito錆兎standswithUkraine Thanks for asking here first. Since it's not really about operating your own website it wouldn't be considered on-topic here, but might over at either Super User if you're planning on using client-side software, or Web Applications for web-based software.

@Nasser No problem. I would just ignore them, AWStats logs everything, including bots of all kinds. Links from reputable sources like GitHub certainly won't hurt :-)

@Nasser It sounds like this is the right site to ask that on given that it's likely about cPanel and AWStats? We have a related question here. There might be protected pages or bots being operated from site A that you can't publicly view. You can disavow them if you like, or just ignore them.

@MartinSleziak You're welcome. I personally wouldn't edit download links just for that reason, but certainly would understand why someone did, particularly if they explained why in their edit comment. One additional consideration is that SSLs can be tricky in that they can become expired, misconfigured, etc... whereas http links would always work with a right-click, so that's perhaps a caveat worth considering too.

There are untold numbers of URLs on SE using http -- editing them all just for one browser, when a simple right-click will do, doesn't seem warranted…but feel free to start a question on Meta SE to ask :-)

The links actually do work, so editing them to use https is really optional. I can't find any Meta questions that suggest otherwise.

@MartinSleziak No problem. Yes, the behavior is as expected on SE sites for browsers that are built on Chromium (e.g., Edge). That's not the case with others that aren't however (e.g., Firefox). If the site containing the file supports https, then it's safe to edit http links to use https instead, though I'm not aware of any Stack Exchange editing guidelines or standards that say that should be done.

If you were to ask that as a question, Super User would really be the better fit since it's specific to using a browser.

@MartinSleziak Since version 86, Chrome started blocking files that are served via http from secured sites using https. Stack Exchanges sites are secure, so files served from non-https sites will be blocked. You can however right click on them and open them in a new window so that they're served just from http alone. See this for more info.

(This is just a comment to keep this room from being frozen due to inactivity)

Happy New Year Max, and everyone else too!

@MikeCiffone Good to see you back at it here. I'm not suggesting we off anyone on Reddit and takeover their profile, but if you know someone there or on Twitter with a lot of followers, plying them with drinks for links to us would be super appreciated - we could really use the activity here :-)

The last time I got a high-profile Reddit user to link back to us that resulted in a question being on the Hot Network Questions list for days.

Ouch. Maybe we should add a tag for self-inflicted-negative-seo, and add a link to us there? :-)

Indeed. I hope nobody got caught last time in the midst of posting something they worked a long time on...or the middle of a critical chat :-/

The first one two days ago was not exactly a great example for webmasters on how to handle maintenance :-)

...And we're back online again, in case anyone noticed we were in read-only mode again for a while tonight. The second maintenance was much better communicated, and showed up in our "Featured on Meta" sidebar ahead of time.

Based on the answers and comments in the Meta question, it looks like we weren't the only ones caught off-guard.

It appears they announced it on Meta yesterday, which is why it didn't appear in our side-bar...I think there's a delay in when that gets updated.

I had no idea about the site maintenance either. Clicking on the links in the read-only banner didn't indicate there was current maintenance going on.

Also, "best practice" questions tend to be a little too subjective to answer - see: Why is asking a question on “best practice” a bad thing?. Maybe you can define what you'd consider "best" to be so users can provide a more definitive and detailed answer than just "A" or "B". Hope you get some helpful answers!

@Baumr I'd suggest splitting them into two separate questions based on what you've already noted there with "Question 1" and "Question 2", and adding a link back to "Question 1" for reference if you like. When users see compound questions like that, they tend to move on because they're difficult to answer and vote on.

@Baumr It's fine to ask those, however can you separate them into two questions? Multiple questions are generally considered too broad. Thanks.

Please see the updates to our Help Center pages detailed here. That covers what's considered on/off-topic here, so it's a good idea to familiarize yourself with that.

In case anyone missed it, or might think it's part of Stack Exchange instead of Pro Webmasters, we've had a featured question here on our Meta site asking for feedback from the community on the one Help page we're able to edit. Any and all feedback is welcome - even a comment is just fine if you don't feel inclined to write an answer. Thanks!

I see, hopefully someone comes along with some in here. Good luck!

@AaronHall We have a related question here, but it looks like that was closed as too broad. There's also this Frequent question on Software Engineering, which gets a bit more technical. If you did ask it here, I'd suggest making it a community wiki.

@NickAlexeev Yes, you can archive a complete page into a WARC (web archive) file. Here's a tutorial on that. HTTrack is also a pretty popular choice for copying sites: httrack.com

@closetnoc No problem - yes, I just saw it and replied. Glad to see you're OK, and back on the site (even if on a limited basis)!

Hi @NormanPotts and @BillyWatsy - welcome to the site!

@IamtheMostStupidPerson I don't know - thanks for asking though. It's unfortunate that he hasn't been active lately, he was a dedicated member and a positive influence on the community. I emailed him a few times, but haven't heard back. Hopefully all is good and that he's just been busy.

@Journer No worries, the Meta site is where we typically discuss issues about the main site, including the help pages: webmasters.meta.stackexchange.com The wording is actually correct, though I can see why you thought it was a typo. By "net" they meant "helpful flags minus declined flags". In other words, flags that were "declined" (deemed not helpful) aren't counted towards receiving a bonus flag. Kudos to you for reading all of that so closely though!

@MrWhite My sentiments as well. It's poorly moderated, unlike our site :-) We sometimes get posts copied & pasted here from Quora as answers, which I wouldn't consider authoritative by any means. I wouldn't be surprised if it was being utilized as a tool for propaganda either...caveat lector.

@jww Good luck with your project, seems like a very worthwhile idea. I've automated form submissions using Perl's WWW::Mechanize module, which should work well on Linux. See the Form Methods here: metacpan.org/pod/WWW::Mechanize#FORM-METHODS

@MaximillianLaumeister @MrWhite I deleted the question - thanks for the heads-up.

@barlop Notepad++ allows you to expand and collapse blocks of code like Chrome. Once you open an HTML document, just click on the minus sign to collapse everything inside that block, or plus sign to expand it again. Here are keyboard shortcuts for this too: superuser.com/questions/647097/…

My advice when choosing a third-party that you'll be relying on is to send an email to their support or sales team prior to selecting them and see how timely and detailed their response is. You can always go to the registrar directly for help too.

@MrWhite Many resellers use APIs that tie into the registrar so it's pretty hard to tell. Using a reseller isn't necessarily a bad thing, they can add a layer of support on top of the registrar, and sometimes can get a faster response if they have a rep assigned to them. Conversely inexperienced resellers can add a layer of misinformation and delays...

Just an FYI, CloudFlare is going to start selling and transferring domains "at cost" (likely the ICANN fee plus credit card processing). They've been a reliable CDN, so that might be a good option for those managing large amounts of domains. They're ICANN accredited btw.

@MrWhite I couldn't find "Krystal" listed as an ICANN accredited registrar: icann.org/registrar-reports/accredited-list.html So unless they're operating under a parent company, which I don't think is permitted under ICANN's registrar agreement, they might be a reseller for another registrar. Their API tie-in should have provided that option, and sounds like they used "GDPR" as an excuse... Glad that you're getting it sorted out though.

@MrWhite Which registrar did you use? Sounds a little wonky to me. During the transfer process with some registrars, if initiated by the current registrant, they usually ask if you want to retain the same contact info or change it. Did you see any options like that (e.g., a checkbox somewhere)? Are you able to edit the registrant info with the new registrar, or is it locked for a period?

So if it's at all possible to extend the voting phase by a week so that most of our community has a chance to vote, please let us know. Thanks!

@Rosie Even more exciting is that after a little outreach (as suggested), we now have three fine nominees! :-) I wish we had positions open for them all. So it looks like we won't need the extra week for the nominations phase after-all. I hope that one week for voting will be enough though - I know that my European friends are still sunbathing in the South of France (not jealous at all), and Labor Day weekend is also upon us...

@Rosie Sounds good. I already reached out to a few, so we'll see.

@Rosie This site is pretty slow, and the timeframe of three weeks, starting with collecting questions, nominations, and voting, seems a little rushed - particularly given that we're also in the peak of Summer vacations. Can we please extend each phase, for example by a week, so that more users will have time to find out about the elections, ask questions, prepare nominations, and then vote? Thanks!