What is LinkController?

LinkController is a group of programs designed to take away much of the work of maintaining the links in a web site. Instead of the user running the program checking whether links are broken, LinkController does this automatically. When it finds a broken link it checks it several times across several days before reporting it broken. This means that if a link is repaired in the meantime (a common case), the user will never be bothered.

How can I find out more?

The manual pages and user guide in HTML format or in PDF formatare available online.

How do I install it

LinkController has been designed for a GNU based system, so will work well in Linux based systems like Debian. Basic installation instructions are given on the LinkController installation page.

How complete is it?

All basic functionality is in place for testing links and repairing problem identified. The software is under development so stability is totally not guaranteed, but then with the exception of the fix-link program, there shouldn't be much risk of data loss so don't worry and make sure you backup your web pages just like normal :-)

Features?

• repeatedly checks a link before declaring it broken
• rapid repair of links based on database
• easy but configurable reporting
• access to pages requiring authentication (new/experimental)
• CGI pages for reporting and repair
• scalability - thousands of links across thousands of pages possible
• low network impact: slow checking and well spread
• low resource utilisation: mostly uses HEAD requests
• configurability
• designed for multi-user use

Where can I get it?

LinkController can be downloaded from http://scotclimb.org.uk/software/linkcont/

LinkController is Free Software and covered by the General Public License to protect your right to maintain and improve your system. When it is more stable it will be contributed to the GNU Project.

Where can I get support?

There is no official support. As I have time and inclination I will answer some questions by mail. If you want to have true support, hire/or retain a Perl consultant. The Perl site has a list. If you are working on the development of LinkController, you'll get all the support I have time to give you (not much, but it'll help).

If someone was willing to set up and maintain a bug tracking database and/or mailing list that would be very neat.

What are the terms of distribution?

LinkController is distributed under the Free Software Foundation's General Public License

What's the status of this page

Last updated $Date: 2002/01/16 19:14:33 $ version $Id: link-controller-homepage.html,v 1.8 2002/01/16 19:14:33 mikedlr Exp $

. Please mail the addresses given in the LinkController documentation if you have any further questions, would like to make suggestions, bug reports etc. would like to offer help or would like help with problems.