Fixing Broken Links
Scan a file (or set of files) for URLs, test every link, and fix any that are broken.
Workflow
1. Extract All Links
Read the target file(s) and collect every URL:
- Markdown links:
[text](url) - Bare URLs:
https://... - HTML
hrefandsrcattributes - Reference-style link definitions:
[id]: url - Local relative paths:
./path/to/file,resources/foo/SKILL.md
2. Test Each Link
For external URLs:
- Use
curl -sL -o /dev/null -w "%{http_code}" --max-time 10 "<url>"to get the HTTP status code - Batch independent checks for speed (run multiple curl commands in parallel or in quick succession)
- Classify results:
- 200–299 → OK - 301/302 → OK but note the redirect target - 403 → Might be valid (some sites block curl); try with a browser user-agent header - 404 → Broken - 429 → Rate limited; retry once after a short pause - 000 or timeout → Retry once; if still failing, mark as unreachable
For local file paths:
- Check if the file exists on disk with
[-f "path"] - If it's a relative path, resolve it from the file's directory
3. Fix Broken Links
For each broken link:
- Search the web for the correct/current URL (the resource may have moved)
- If found, replace the old URL with the new one
- If the resource no longer exists, note it and either:
- Remove the link and leave the text - Comment it out with a note - Replace with an archived version (web.archive.org)
4. Report
Produce a summary table:
| URL | Status | Action |
|-----|--------|--------|
| https://example.com/page | 200 | OK |
| https://old.example.com/moved | 404 → 301 | Updated to https://new.example.com/page |
| ./docs/missing.md | MISSING | Removed link |Tips
- For large files with many links, batch curl calls to avoid slowdowns
- Some sites (GitHub, npm) rate-limit aggressively — space out requests
- Always re-read the file after making changes to confirm replacements didn't break formatting
- For Markdown files, verify link syntax is preserved:
[text](url)not[text](url)(no extra spaces)