Finding and fixing broken links
The Broken links page scans your knowledge base for references that no longer lead anywhere: dead links to other articles, images that no longer exist, and links to unpublished content. From the list, Open in editor jumps straight to the right article so you can fix it.
Short answer: go to Content and open Broken links. Sarrai scans your articles for references that no longer lead anywhere and lists them per language. Click Open in editor on a row to open the source article and fix the reference.
What the scan finds
The page looks for three kinds of broken references:
- Links to another article that no longer exists. If an article points to another article that has since been deleted or archived, that link surfaces here.
- Images that no longer load. If you placed an image somewhere that is now gone, you'll see it listed here.
- Links to unpublished content. If you point to an internal article that someone later unpublishes, the link stops working for your visitors and shows up in this overview.
That last one is why the page is so useful: a link can work perfectly the moment you place it and quietly break later because something changes elsewhere. The scan catches that for you.
Two kinds you don't expect
A link to a draft counts too. If you point from a published article to one you haven't published yet, that target doesn't exist on your public knowledge base and your visitor clicks a dead anchor. The row disappears the moment you publish the target article, so you don't have to touch the link itself.
A relative path is never tried and always flagged. A reference like ../handbook/README.md, typically a leftover from imported documentation, cannot work on a public knowledge base by definition. Sarrai makes no attempt to resolve such a path and lists it right away. So it isn't a false alarm that will sort itself out later.
This overview is also the only place where you see an image that fails to load or a relative path like that. The link panels in the article editor deliberately leave those out, because those panels are about articles referring to each other. Skip this page and you'll only notice such problems when a visitor stumbles over one.
How to fix a broken link
- Open Content in the menu and go to Broken links.
- Look through the list. Each row shows the source article (the one containing the reference), the type (for example external link, internal link or image), the reference itself, and the reason it counts as broken.
- Click Open in editor on the right. A new tab opens with the article editor, already on the right article and in the right language.
- Replace or remove the reference and publish the article again.
Running the scan again
The first time you open the page, Sarrai runs the scan automatically. Just fixed a link? Click Rescan at the top right to refresh the list. That way you see your own progress right away: resolved references drop out of the overview.
Per language
The list shows broken links per language. At the top you switch between languages with the tabs (for example NL-BE and EN), each with a counter showing how many are still open. This lets you clean up your knowledge base one language at a time. For more on maintaining multilingual content, see Offering an article in multiple languages.
Why the page can be slow to open
This isn't a stored report waiting somewhere: it's recalculated every time you open the page, with real requests out to the internet and an on-disk check for your own images. On a large knowledge base with many external links, opening it therefore takes noticeably long. That's the check itself, not a fault.
Two things to keep in mind when reading the reason. "Unreachable" doesn't automatically mean "broken": a slow or temporarily down server gives the same message as a page that really is gone, so check doubtful cases yourself. And older articles sometimes report nothing: links written in markdown notation used to go unrecognised, so an article you haven't saved since then still carries an index from before that improvement. One Rescan, or simply saving the article again, brings those to the surface.
The page is only open to administrators and content managers, precisely because the check fires real requests out to the internet. An operator doesn't see the button, and anyone opening the URL directly lands on their own start page without a message.
Good to know
A broken link isn't just annoying for your visitors, Sarrai also can't use a source that no longer leads anywhere. Going through broken links every now and then belongs to keeping your knowledge base healthy, alongside review dates and the filter for outdated content. See Keeping your content current for the full approach.
Also searched as
"find dead links", "fix broken link", "image no longer loading", "link to deleted article", "unpublished article still linked"
See also
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