Inconsistent naming for Links

[karmadude]

There seems to be inconsistent naming when it comes to links. Some places it's links, other places blogroll and now now bookmarks. Could all this be consolidated into either links or bookmarks to avoid all the confusion.

[foolswisdom]

Please explain where the various terms are used and what makes it confusing or incorrect.

[markjaquith]

I'm +1 for "Bookmarks" for the following reasons:

• Not all lists of links are "Blogrolls"
• "Blogroll" is a term that has no real-life connotation
• "Blogroll" is a trendy term that very well may be transient
• "Bookmarks" is used in the back end (WP functions)

[ryan]

I like bookmarks too, but we've been bouncing back and forth and I'm just going to sit this round out. :-)

[foolswisdom]

markjaquith, sneaky sneaky, you seem to be changing the topic of this ticket ;_) If I understand correctly, karamdude's initial report is that in some places it is not consistent.

karamadude, JeremyVisser found one in #3718, are there others?

[markjaquith]

Well, you can't solve inconsistency without choosing which consistency you want. :-)

[johnbillion]

I vote for reverting to "links" and using the term consistently as it's unarguably the most descriptive and simplist term. "Blogroll" is an atrocious term and whoever decided to use it should be shot at dawn.

I'm not sure about "bookmarks". The links on your blog aren't really bookmarks are they? They're, um, links.

[Otto42]

My 2 cents:

The Blogroll link should be named "Bookmarks", and most of it should be moved to somewhere under "Manage" like the posts and such are. Everywhere that references "Links" on these pages should be changed to "Bookmarks". The term "Links" causes confusion among many people to whom "links" are any sort of a href inside a post or elsewhere.

So, I say that we should:

• Move Blogroll->Manage Blogroll to Manage->Bookmarks.
• Move Blogroll->Import Links to Manage->Import Bookmarks.
• Eliminate Blogroll->Add Links entirely (there's an "Add links" link on the Manage Blogroll page already, although it should have a more obvious placement)
• Modify both of the new Manage pages to call them Bookmarks.

[Otto42]

Bookmark renaming/menu reordering patch

[Otto42]

There's a patch to do what I described above. Most of it, anyway, I may have missed a few spots.

[rob1n]

I want to push for "Bookmarks."

[rob1n]

Actually, "Links."

[Otto42]

"Links" = Bad.
"Bookmarks" = Good.

If I say I posted a "link", did I post a link to the bookmarks section, or did I just stick an anchor tag inside a post? If somebody tells me that they can't post a link, what am I to think?

Using "Links" adds more confusion.
Using "Bookmarks" eliminates confusion.

[johnbillion]

I have no preference on this subject but I think "Links" is by far the most universally understood description for, well, links. They are hyperlinks after all.

Otto42, if someone was to instead ask you how they add a link to their blog, you'd have to tell them to click on "Bookmarks" because that's what they're called in WordPress. If, however, someone is used to calling links "Bookmarks" then they'll know what tab they have to click on anyway.

[Otto42]

Replying to johnbillion:

I have no preference on this subject but I think "Links" is by far the most universally understood description for, well, links. They are hyperlinks after all.

That's the problem here. They're not just hyperlinks. They have several attributes associated with them. They have XFN. They can have images associated with them. They have the ability to associate RSS feed URLs with them. Wordpress has code in it to determine the last time these "links" were updated and to then store that information for display and sorting purposes.

Bookmarks are more than links.

Otto42, if someone was to instead ask you how they add a link to their blog, you'd have to tell them to click on "Bookmarks" because that's what they're called in WordPress. If, however, someone is used to calling links "Bookmarks" then they'll know what tab they have to click on anyway.

No, if somebody asked me how to add a link to their blog, I'd tell them to enter the a href tag into a post like they'd enter a link anywhere else.

A link is just a link. You can make links anywhere.
Bookmarks are more than just lists of links.

[brianlayman]

Adding in del.icio.us's social bookmarking being so familiar, Otto, you just might have convinced me. I was always very far into the "Links" camp. I didn't like bookmarks because many softwar packages use that for internal stuff, like bookmarking a post/page you want to return to. So I liked Links better. But thinking of social bookmarking, I am now moving to the bookmarks camp.

I do wonder if the menu title be "Bookmarking" work any better?

[cpoteet]

I'm going to have to go with "Links," because for those using it as a CMS that aren't tech saavy then "Links" is much more familiar.

[matt]

There is a broader effort underway to re-organize the entire menu structure and wording for 2.3. Rather than one-off changes, let's make a more comprehensive move later this month. So this is WILLFIX, but later, and under another ticket.

[cpoteet]

No menu structure was changed in 2.3 BTW. This needs to be done.

[ryan]

The new admin design uses Links.