We checked every link, image and video in the site's pages, resources and news. These are the ones that go nowhere. Each one is also broken on today's vlct.org; the move to the new site didn't cause them, it just made them easier to find.
Most fixes are one of three moves: point the link at the right place, point it at an archived copy, or take the link out and keep the words.
We don't have to wait for every decision. We propose holding broken links while the site is displayed: the page text in WordPress stays as it is, and each held link is logged so nothing is lost. When VLCT decides on a link, we fix it for good and remove the hold.
See Advance Planning for Disasters for a checklist.
Visitor clicks and lands on "Page not found."See Advance Planning for Disasters for a checklist.
Same words, no dead link.See Advance Planning for Disasters for a checklist.
Dotted underline, only when logged in: "Held: broken link, waiting on a decision."| Hold | What visitors see | Used for |
|---|---|---|
unlink | The words stay; the link is removed. | Deleted and unpublished pages, dead outside links with no archived copy. The default. |
archive | The link opens the Internet Archive's saved copy. | Dead outside links where a copy was saved ( of them). |
redirect | The link goes to the page that replaced it. | Deleted vlct.org pages with an obvious replacement. |
hide video | The empty video frame is removed. | Removed or private videos. |
keep | Nothing changes. | Links VLCT wants left alone. |
Plus outside links we couldn't test automatically because those sites block automated checks (FEMA, USDA, Constant Contact and others). They are almost certainly fine and aren't counted above.
The same rows are in the spreadsheet (VLCT-broken-links.xlsx), which has a Decision column for Fix, Remove or Keep.