Cool URLs Don’t Change, Unless…

Published on Jan 23, 2025 (updated Mar 10, 2025), filed under development (feed). (Share this on Mastodon or Bluesky?)

I cannot imagine I’m the only one missing and then mentally making the following amendment, and so I can’t help but document a brief, deferential refinement of Tim Berners-Lee’s 1998 classic, Cool URIs Don’t Change:

Cool URLs don’t change—unless they are being redirected.

But—the first—, this is imprecise (which I think starts with the original, but that I’m open to have put on me), and reminds of a language game. The imprecision seems to originate in the unspoken connection between a URL and a resource, with resources being moved being the cause of URLs changing (“cool resources don’t move”?).

But—the second—, it’s also nothing new (you’ll work like this), and it’s merely spelling out a crucial aspect of web maintenance and hygiene. We don’t always get resource locations and URLs right, but we are (or should be) able to redirect and therefore deprecate the ones that don’t fit our architecture or preferences anymore.

“URLs,” not “URIs,” in the spirit of the URL standard; and redirected, of course, to an available, equivalent, and, ideally, useful destination.

About Me

I’m Jens (long: Jens Oliver Meiert), and I’m a web developer, manager, and author. I’ve been working as a technical lead and engineering manager for companies you’ve never heard of and companies you use every day, I’m an occasional contributor to web standards (like HTML, CSS, WCAG), and I write and review books for O’Reilly and Frontend Dogma.

I love trying things, not only in web development and engineering management, but also in other areas like philosophy. Here on meiert.com I share some of my experiences and views. (I value you being critical, interpreting charitably, and giving feedback.)