SearchSL.com Beta

Tired of trying to find SL sites in del.icio.us (or just tired of trying to spell it)? Check out www.searchsl.com, a new feature of the SLUniverse.com web site. SearchSL is a directory of Second Life related web sites, organized by category in a familiar Yahoo-style format. Users can submit their own sites for inclusion simply by clicking Suggest Link when they are in a category (they can also suggest new categories). RSS feeds are available for each category as well.

The site is currently in beta, so it may have a few glitches and will be undergoing some fine tuning, but check it out and add your SL site. The more sites added, the more useful it becomes. The directory is free to be listed in - I only ask that you add a link back to the www.sluniverse.com home page or directly to www.searchsl.com to the sites you submit. Featured links will also be an advertising option in the future. Please send any feedback to [email]cristiano@sluniverse.com[/email] .

I have decided to expand the directory to also include in world locations. If you would like to have your inworld location included, please submit a SLURL with a title and description for your place. I may be moving some categories around a little bit and adding new ones - if you feel it should be in a category that does not yet exist, include that in the submission comments - those are not visible to anyone but me. Thank you again to everyone so far that has submitted sites - it is a bit blog heavy at the moment, but already I have gotten the chance to see some sites I've never seen before. Keep submitting - the more content the site has, the more useful it becomes.

PS - as a reminder, to submit a link, go into the desired category and click Submit Link at the top.

I have added preview thumbnails to the site listings:

Hi, I just tried to submit an slurl to my shop, but the link is too long to fit for the url field of the submission form.

Incidentally, I don't know if you want to list such a small store (I'm just starting up, gonna expand soon.) It's your call of course.

I saw the error message and expanded the link length - the software was set to only 100 characters (since most URLs are not that long) - I expanded it to 255. If you can't get it to go through, include the link in the submission comments and just put a bogus link in, and I will see what I can do (or just email me at [email]cristiano@sluniverse.com[/email]).

I increased the limit on URLs to 1000 characters to accomodate long SLURLs. I have not yet had a chance to create many categories for in world categories - when you submit a site, if you don't see a category for it, include a suggested category in the submission comments please. I am going to be moving stuff around a bit but will try to get stuff in the desired category as much as possible. Also, I have been adding some sites myself that I am aware of - if you own a site and want to change the listed description or have it recategorized, please let me know.

I'd like to see an external search engine with more SL-specific search features, and one that grabs data from the Classifieds on SL.

Cool - I love the thumbnails! I'll go back and update my listings.

great idea, glad to be a part of it! I am going to have both the IVM and Out of Bounds Software sites link back to it!

Does my previewer go in development tools?

Nice work IM going to add my url's now.

Yeah, that is fine - preferrably a site about it, not just a direct link to the download, but either is fine. If you can think of a more appropriate category, feel free to suggest it - the categories are expanding all the time as new links are submitted.

Hm, well maybe I'll make a site for it later. Hopefully the Avimator guys see this and submit. Or should I just submit the link for them?

It is a really great tool - you definitely should consider making a page for it showing the features and also listing the system requriements before someone downloads.

As far as other sites, feel free to submit any SL related sites.

I had a question hehe, and its probably right infront of me but I figure I will ask anyways incase anyone else is lost....How do we get the thumbnails up for the links? I notice alot dont have them.

So far, it seems that the sites that most frequently won't have a preview are blogs from blogspot.com for some reason. Most other sites, though not all, do show a preview. Sometimes they do not show initially, but will show eventually as the site is spidered by the previewer. Your site does have a preview already.

There is an update coming to the directory script that will allow custom thumbnail images as an alternative for sites that don't preview or would rather show a logo. That release comes out in the next few weeks, and I will integrate it once it is available.

You can also try this link to include your site in the previewer:

http://www.girafa.com/updateurl.acr

Thanks, I will try that out and see how it works out. I also have a suggestion of possibly making it so people can edit the links they submit to the site.

~Stormy