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I see that there are many links in comments that don't have link text, therefore hard for me to know if the link is worth to click. For example, this link: https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/47581/....

You are hesitate to click on that, right? You are feeling to wasting time if you click on that, aren't you? So, if possible, please consider to add the title of the link in it.

You can use this userscript to shorten the time and effort to do that: Convert share links to markdown [title](url)

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    $\begingroup$ I would assume if somebody with high rep, but especially somebody who is a moderator, leaves a comment that says a question is related, it's probably related. And since learning new things is a good thing, why would it not be worth clicking on and seeing what it says? $\endgroup$
    – tpg2114
    Nov 15, 2015 at 17:32
  • $\begingroup$ yes, logically, we know that link is worth to click. However, giving a vague information always requires the brain to judging if it's worth or not. The link is worth to click, but to know it's worth, it requires more energy to process. Giving the information right at the start eliminates that judging effort, hence leaving the energy to do other useful things, such as understanding the problem. There is a site dedicated just for this: User Experience $\endgroup$
    – Ooker
    Nov 15, 2015 at 17:57
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    $\begingroup$ Except I would say that saying "Related:" is all the information you would need to judge it's worth. Somebody who is experienced on the site (and in this case, is a master at knowing virtually every question on the site somehow) said that it is related to your question. It's still up to you if "This is related to what you are asking" is worth reading about, and that's true even if a summary or the title of the post was included. Perhaps even more so because titles are not always clearly indicative of content. $\endgroup$
    – tpg2114
    Nov 15, 2015 at 18:03
  • $\begingroup$ It can be true for the OP, who need the knowledge utmost to solve the problem. But when a visitor comes in, they may just need to expand their knowledge. In some cases, they are there because they feel that the question can partly solve their problem, so they need a good direction to know if they are reaching to the right part or not. $\endgroup$
    – Ooker
    Nov 15, 2015 at 18:34
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    $\begingroup$ Note that when we put just a "related: <link>" message, we mostly do it so that the other question shows up in the "linked" sidebar. The comment is simply a means to this end. Otherwise we'd write more text as well. $\endgroup$
    – user10851
    Nov 16, 2015 at 5:36
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    $\begingroup$ @ChrisWhite it'd still be nicer to have the question title in the comment itself, and this does that at the cost of even less clicks than before. Shouldn't be compulsory, but it's a nice tool. $\endgroup$
    – Emilio Pisanty
    Nov 16, 2015 at 13:50
  • $\begingroup$ For another perspective, I'd actually be more concerned with [title](url) links because I either have to hover to check the url or click on the link to find out where it leads. Leaving it as url shows exactly where you're being taken (though a mischievous person could type [fake PSE url](real url) and take you elsewhere...) $\endgroup$
    – Kyle Kanos
    Nov 16, 2015 at 19:25
  • $\begingroup$ @KyleKanos so it's all about trust. And as you have pointed out, faker will find a way to fake $\endgroup$
    – Ooker
    Nov 17, 2015 at 6:05
  • $\begingroup$ (1) Not sure what your point is, as your usescript doesn't prevent that (2) No, it's not all about trust here. I said For another perspective to indicate that someone could link fake content & that would be the use of just posting the url directly. I post the url directly because (a) I'm lazy and (b) I want the link to show up in the "Related" section. $\endgroup$
    – Kyle Kanos
    Nov 17, 2015 at 11:11

2 Answers 2

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I will add that the site Bookmarklets for Stack Exchange contains several useful bookmarklets. The one called "Formatted link to a webpage" is useful exactly for situation like this - if you want quickly get a link to the current page formatted in the [text](url) format which is suitable both for comments and for posts on Stack Exchange.

For example, if I use it on this question I get: [Use this userscript when you share a link](https://physics.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7232) If I use if after I clicked on a link to this answer, I get: [Use this userscript when you share a link](https://physics.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7232#10702). Both links are correctly rendered in posts/comments Use this userscript when you share a link and Use this userscript when you share a link.

Just in case the linked website stops working at some point in the future, here is the source of the bookmarklet and also Internet Archive link.

t=window.getSelection().toString();
if (!t && document.querySelector('h1')) {
  t=document.querySelector('h1').textContent.replace(/ \[closed\]| \[on hold\]| \[duplicate\]/g,'').trim();
}
else if (!t) {
  t=document.title.split('-')[0].trim(); 
}
u=window.location.href;
if (typeof StackExchange!=='undefined' && u.indexOf('area51')==-1 && /^[qa]/.test(u.split('/')[3])) {
  u=window.location.protocol+'//'+window.location.hostname+'/q/'+window.location.pathname.split('/')[2]+window.location.hash;
}
window.prompt('Copy to Clipboard','['+t+']('+u+')');
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One can use the Stack Overflow Extra add-on for this. It is a userscript that has a lot of features and tweaks for Stack Exchange. Highly recommended.

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