404 not found

[buttercup]

It often happens that I click on a link in a post, and I get the error message 404 not found. It's apparent, though, from the way other posters respond, that they were able to reach the linked site OK. Can someone explain?

 

[69Shooter]

Other posters probably used the link while it was still "active". By the time you got to it, it wasn't.

 

[The Options Menu]

It often happens that I click on a link in a post, and I get the error message 404 not found. It's apparent, though, from the way other posters respond, that they were able to reach the linked site OK. Can someone explain?

a '404' is a standard server response code that says, "What you're looking for isn't here". Normally it means that it's a bad link, or that a page has been moved / renamed / deleted, but load issues on a server or whacky generated content issues can trigger them as well (especially when software is dynamically spitting out pages on demand).

That's the short and sloppy version...

 

[Rockslinger]

Other posters probably used the link while it was still "active". By the time you got to it, it wasn't.

Yup, the pics of a naked Queen Elizabeth II were already taken down. You too slow. Hee, hee, hee.