How to Link-Check a Website with Dynamically

Discussion of the technology underlying the eValid solution.

How to Link-Check a Website with Dynamically

Postby proj1 » Sun Jan 10, 2010 3:29 am

If a website you're analyzing has dynamically generated content then
server-side link checking methods will miss a lot of errors. You can
use a special eValid command to check links on a page as it is
actually delivered to the browser. This is true client side link
checking.

Edit eValid's DynamicLinkCheck command into a simple script that
starts with the URL you want to test:

#
# eValid Playback Script for Dynamic Link Checking
#
InitLink "http://www.mysite.com"
DynamicLinkCheck
#

The DynamicLinkCheck command runs the built-in Link Wizard on the URL
you indicate, and then runs the resulting link checks as a sub-script
to the parent. When eValid finishes, use eValid > View >
Message/Error Log to see if any links are broken or unavailable.

Remember: eValid will show an error if one of the links really is not
available (a "404" error) or if it downloads so slowly that
one of the internal time limits is exceeded. eValid's view of
"broken" is entirely from the user's view.
proj1
 
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Joined: Sun Jan 10, 2010 3:23 am

Re: How to Link-Check a Website with Dynamically

Postby eValid » Tue Jan 12, 2010 12:56 pm

proj1 wrote:If a website you're analyzing has dynamically generated content then server-side link checking methods will miss a lot of errors. You can use a special eValid command to check links on a page as it is actually delivered to the browser. This is true client side link checking.

Edit eValid's DynamicLinkCheck command into a simple script that starts with the URL you want to test:

#
# eValid Playback Script for Dynamic Link Checking
#
InitLink "http://www.mysite.com"
DynamicLinkCheck
#

The DynamicLinkCheck command runs the built-in Link Wizard on the URL you indicate, and then runs the resulting link checks as a sub-script to the parent. When eValid finishes, use eValid > View > Message/Error Log to see if any links are broken or unavailable.

Remember: eValid will show an error if one of the links really is not available (a "404" error) or if it downloads so slowly that one of the internal time limits is exceeded. eValid's view of "broken" is entirely from the user's view.

Yes, that's basically correct.

Note that eValid can read all of the links that exist in the page because eValid can read the Document Object Model (DOM) of the page after it is loaded into the browser. So, even if the links vary over time -- as they so often do -- you are assured that this dynamic test will [attempt to] visit every actual link on the current page. That's the meaning of "dynamic" here.

--The eValid Team
eValid
 
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Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2008 12:48 pm
Location: USA


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