Links status

Links status is a sub-feature under the Analytics section of Document360. This feature is a broken link checker that helps validate and monitor all internal, external, and media file links on the knowledge base. It helps you to fix bad/broken links to improve Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and enhance the reader experience.

Accessing Links status

1. Click on the Analytics menu icon on the left side menu
2. Now select the Links status on the left navigation pane
3. You can see the Links status overview page
4. Using the dropdown at the top of the page, you can select the project version and language you want to check
5. You can find the list of all the links used in the selected version and the language of your Knowledge base

Links status overview page

This page contains all the necessary data and stats regarding the links used in your Knowledge base (selected version and language). You have two sections on the page: Links status and Links list.

1. Links status section

Links classification

• Total – The total number of URLs and files (both internal and external) linked in the different articles on your Knowledge base

• Internal – The total number of Internal URLs (article links, category index links, category page links, anchor links, tag links, contributor links, and media file links within your Document360 project)

• External – The total number of External URLs (Any link used in your articles and category pages that points to a web location outside your Document360 project)

• Ignored - The links you want the Document360 Link checker to ignore in the current or upcoming validations

Current state

• Working – The link works fine and points to an intended webpage or file (Internal and External).

• Unknown – The link that does not return a status.

• Broken – A broken or dead link is a hyperlink in the article that no longer works. The cause maybe it's encountering one or more of the issues like URL changes, incorrect URL, page or item removed, or restricted/private knowledge base article URL. Broken status applies to URLs and media files.

• Sub-states - Working redirected, Broken redirected, and Unknown redirected.
  Redirected - When the link has been temporarily or permanently routed to a different URL.

2. Links report

Below the Links status section on the overview page, you can find the list of links used in your Knowledge base articles, category, and index pages. You can find the following info columns for each link.

Suppose you have deleted an article after the validation, and the report has been generated. In that case, the article will be grayed out. A trash icon appears next to the article.

Pagination

You can easily navigate to the desired page. When you have bulk links, it consumes a lot of time navigating to the desired page. With the help of this option, you can save time.

1. Type in the desired page number in the page number field at the bottom and press the Enter/Return key
2. You are navigated to the desired page

3. Filter and Sort links list

The filter option available at the top of the Links list section would come in handy when you have a more significant number of links. You can filter links based on three parameters: the Visibility, link type, and status.

Search links

Choose the Search by dropdown to choose whether you want to search Article URL, Redirect URL, or just URL (Both article and redirect URL). You can also use the search bar to identify and retrieve specific domain names or URLs.

Filters

• Source - Filter links by Article links, Category links, or All (both article and category links).

• Visibility - Filter links from either Visible or Hidden articles in your knowledge base. If you want to search visible and hidden, select None (default selection).
  

• Link type filters – Redirect URL, Internal URL, External URL, Media URL, Secured URL, and Unsecured URL.
  

• Status filters – Working, Redirected, Ignored, and Broken.
  

How to use the filter?

Click on the Filter option and select the Link types and Status. If you want to hide this bar, click the Hide filter option again.

You can sort all the columns in the links list in ascending or descending order (alphanumeric). Just click on the List column heading to change the sort type. The default setting would be ascending based on the link addition time.

Quick filters

• Below the link status tiles, you can find the quick filter options. Hidden, Category links, Broken, Unknown, Redirect URL, and Media URL. Click on any of these options to filter the links.

• Alternatively, you can also click on the different tiles on the Link status bar above to access the different types of links in the links list below.

4. Export links report

You can export the Links list and status into .csv (Excel spreadsheet).

1. Click on the Export CSV option next to the Filter
2. Wait for a few seconds, and a Download icon appears next to the Export CSV
3. Click on the Download icon, and the exported file is downloaded onto your local computer storage
4. This file can be viewed on any application for spreadsheets like Microsoft Excel and others

Actions and Controls

Above the Links status sections, you can find the controls and data regarding the link analytics.

a. Validation type

Scheduled validation, Manual validation, and Article level validation

b.Report data

The date of the reports generated would be loaded here (up to the last five previous report dates). The validation reports are named as per the generation date.

When you hover over the 'i' (info) icon adjacent to the Report data dropdown, you can view the next or upcoming Scheduled link validation date.

c. Validate project links

This button initiates the Manual link validation process when you click on it at a project level.

d. Manage ignored links

This button opens up a blade on the right. This blade contains information about the links that are ignored or included in the validations. You can perform actions like ignore, include, filter, and export the information.

e. Manual validation usage:

This progress bar shows your project's available Manual validation limit depending on your plan. The limit resets every month.

Customers of all price tiers can opt for a link limit increase anytime based on their requirement for a nominal charge.
Just contact our support team to help you out.

f. Link analytics usage

This progress bar shows the stats on the link limit used out of the total given limit for your project.

Links analytics limit exceeded

When the links count is higher than the total given limit for your project, the Links analytics limit exceeded message appears instead of the Link analytics usage

• When the link analytics limit is exceeded, and the links validation (both Scheduled and Manual validation) takes place, only the links under the total given limit are validated.
• The extra links that exceed the limit are not validated. Article level validation is also not possible for those links.

For example, your total link limit is 10000, but the total links count in your project is 10500. Only the first 10000 links are validated when you perform the links validation. The recently added 500 links are not validated.

• To validate all the links in your project, contact our support team to increase the limit.

Link validation

You can run the link validation at a version and language level with the following types of validations.

1. Scheduled validation
2. Manual validation
3. Article level validation

1. Scheduled validation

As the name suggests, this is an automated link validation that runs on a Schedule based on your plan tier.

1. Click on the Analytics menu icon on the left side menu
2. Now select the last option Links status on the left navigation pane
3. You can see the Links status overview page with all the data in Link statuses
4. At the top, you can find the Validation type dropdown; select Scheduled validation (Which would be the default setting in your projects)
5. You can find the recently generated Scheduled link validation
6. If you want to look into any previous reports, select the Report date dropdown and select the report date you wish to view
7. When you hover over the 'i' (info) icon adjacent to the Report date dropdown, you can view the next or upcoming scheduled link validation date

2. Manual validation

1. Click on the Analytics menu icon on the left side menu
2. Now select the last option Links status on the left navigation pane
3. You can see the Links status overview page with all the data in Link statuses
4. At the top, you can find the Validation type dropdown, select Manual validation
5. You can find the latest Manual validation report on the Link status overview page
6. Click on the Validate Project Links button, and a new manual validation process can be run anytime

7. Once the validation is complete, a mail is sent to your registered email, and you can view the analytics report on the overview page

3. Article level validation

When choosing the Article level validation from the Validation type dropdown, you can view the article/category-page link validations you have already run. This overview page will be empty if you haven't validated links at the article/category page level.

Manage Ignored links

Click the Manage ignored links button on the Links status overview page. A blade with all the ignored link information would open on the right.

Ignored links overview

Project links - The total number of links available in the project
Ignored - The total number of links chosen to be ignored in the validation

This section provides a high-level view of all the top metrics in the broken links.

a. Link - The complete URL
b. Link type - External/Internal URL
c. Dependency - The number of times the link has been referenced in the knowledge base articles
d. Status - Ignored or Included
e. Pagination - You can easily navigate to the desired page. When you have bulk links, it consumes a lot of time navigating to the desired page. With the help of this option, you can save time.

• Type in the desired page number in the page number field at the bottom and press the Enter/Return key
• You are navigated to the desired page

Add link(s) to ignored list

In the manage ignored links blade, select the links with the status 'included', and an Ignore button appears at the top of the list.

Click on the Ignore button, and the selected link(s) is(are) omitted from the following validation onwards.

Remove link(s) from ignored list

In the manage ignored links blade, select the links with the status 'ignored', and an Include button appears at the top of the list.

Click on the Include button, and the selected link(s) is(are) included from the subsequent validation onwards.

Export ignored links report

You can export the ignored and included links list and status into .xlsx (Excel spreadsheet).

1. Click on the Export CSV option above the filter option
2. Wait for a few seconds, and a Download icon appears next to the Export CSV
3. Click on the Download icon, and the exported file is downloaded onto your local computer storage
4. This file can be viewed on any application for spreadsheets like Microsoft Excel and others

FAQ

1. What is a scheduled validation?

Scheduled validation is an automated link validation that runs on a Schedule based on your plan tier.

For more information, see scheduled validation.

2. What is manual validation?

Manual validation can be performed when you want to validate the project links manually. This option comes in handy when cross-checking the fixed broken links.
For more information, see manual validation.

3. What is article-level validation?

The compiled data of the article link validations performed at each article appears here. If you haven't validated links at the article level, this overview page will be empty.
For more information, see article level validation.

4. What is the limit for manual validation usage?

The manual validation resets on the 1st of every month.

5. What is the link analytics usage?

The links analytics usage shows the limitation of link validation at the project level. Below is the restriction of each plan:

6. What is an unknown and broken link?

Broken link: A broken or dead link is a hyperlink in the article that no longer works; because it's encountering one or more of the issues like URL changes, incorrect URL, page or item removed, or restricted/private knowledge base article URL. Broken link status applies to URLs and media files.

Unknown link: Unknown links cannot be processed or requires authorization. The unknown links do not return a status.

7. Does links analytics work effectively in the private version?

The links analytics crawls all the public URLs.

7. Why do broken links include working internal links?

The links would be private content (private project/version/language/category/article). Only the public and working links can be part of the working links. This is because private articles can be accessed only with valid login credentials.

8. What is an ignored link?

Ignored links are not considered for link validation. You can mark a known broken link as an ignored link. However, ignored links would be visible to search engines and external tools.

9. What are secured and unsecured links?

• Secured links start with HTTPS: while unsecured links start with HTTP:
• The "S" stands for secure
• Secured links have SSL certificates, while unsecured links don't have SSL certificates

10. What are category links?

Category links refer to the links present in the category pages.

11. Can I export the links report?

Yes, you can export the links report as a CSV file. This file can be viewed on any application for spreadsheets like Microsoft Excel and others.