Disabled External Links

On pages where there is little point in providing a means for a visitor to leave the website I have added a shim that disables the link or I have remove the external link completely.

Like so many things once you have worked them out they seem obvious. Why have I been providing links for visitors to leave? The links were for my own use and I have other ways of keeping track of them and making then available to me online. Even on my iPad I can look at the source code to see what the link is and when I am in development mode I can just click on them from the source in the editor.

Final Straw

Having shimmed external links I observered an access to my research links page, presumably directly. I suspect it was someone looking for a link to Portway Stoves.

An example of a disabled external link.

Two Versions

Well actually at least three! Now that I have decided to disable all external links on pages that I see accessed, I am either adding a shim or I am commenting out the External Links section entirely.

The version on this page is for "technical" - non history related pages. The version for history pages has a shim which refers to the "subscription" to Geneology websites. A twist on this is that on some pages the external link is still available but it no longer looks like a hyperlink.

A disabled "History" shim can be found on my BW Auction page.