Before a wiki can switch from ShortUrl to UrlShortener, the ShortUrl extension first needs to gain a feature to keep the exsiting URLs working. There are also a number of user interface improvements and transitional optoins needed during the migration.
Before and after
From T107188#11181721:
| ShortUrl UI (old) | UrlShortener UI (new) |
|---|---|
 |  |
List of wikis from wmf-config:
'wmgUseShortUrl' => [ 'default' => false, 'bdwikimedia' => true, // T146014 'bhwiki' => true, // T113348 'bnwiki' => true, // T62956 'bnwikisource' => true, // T127968 'eswikibooks' => true, // T96668 'gomwiki' => true, // T206741 'hiwiki' => true, 'hiwikiversity' => true, // T177187 'knwiki' => true, // T97218 'knwikisource' => true, // T189287 'maiwiki' => true, // T125802 'mrwiki' => true, // T103646 'newiki' => true, // T92820 'orwiki' => true, 'orwikisource' => true, // T124429 'orwiktionary' => true, // T103644 'pawiki' => true, // T178919 'sawiki' => true, // T94660 'sawikibooks' => true, // T94660 'sawikiquote' => true, // T94660 'sawikisource' => true, // T94660 'sawiktionary' => true, // T94660 'tawiki' => true, 'tawikibooks' => true, 'tawikinews' => true, 'tawikiquote' => true, 'tawikisource' => true, 'tawiktionary' => true, 'tcywiki' => true, // T150166 'urwiki' => true, // T138507 ],
Discovery for new short URLs.
T288653: Make URLShortener service discoverable for users
- https://w.wiki features a URL creation form.
- Special page enabled on local wikis, warning-free.
- Promote local Special page on Special:SpecialPages.
Discover short URL for current article when reading
The "ShortUrl" extension promoted the URL under the page title. This was cheap to do as the URLs were deterministic. We may not be able to do this from a performance perspective (T107188#6275214) and it may not be desirable design-wise, but we can instead expose an affordance in the sidebar toolbox.
- T289999: Implement design review of toolbox link for url shortener
- T267921: Roll out the Toolbox link for URL Shortener in Wikimedia sites
Migration plan
Revised plan from T107188#11181721 by @Krinkle and @JTweed-WMF, based on earlier plan by @Ladsgroup and @Legoktm:
- Develop a read-only flag for the legacy ShortUrl extension.
- Develop a sidebar UI in the new UrlShortener extension. T267921
- Develop simplified read-only URL resolver for ShortUrl database in UrlShortener extension repo behind a feature flag: $wgUrlShortenerLegacyTemplate. change 1275373
- Reach out to the ~30 communities where the legacy ShortUrl extension is enabled, and advise migrating gadgets away from the class="title-shortlink" element. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech/News/2025/45
- Enable wgUrlShortenerLegacyTemplate on test2wiki (which already has ShortUrl disabled, so the old dataset can be tested there).
- Enable wgUrlShortenerLegacyTemplate on these ~30 wikis and disable the ShortUrl extension. T256993
- Undeploy the ShortUrl extension. https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/1304247
- Archive the ShortUrl extension. T429658: Archive the ShortUrl extension
