Ask HN: Why don't we indicate internal vs. external links?

[nealrs]

Hypertext is great - but how come we don't (in general) indicate whether links are internal or external? Sure, you can mouseover a link and check the status bar at the bottom - but that's not very obvious for your average user.

Why not visually indicate whether a link is internal / external with a glyph (::after) or a separate color (maybe orange instead of standard blue?)

Is anyone out there doing something like this? Do you think it'd improve the web experience?

[detaro]

Some sites do that (wikis being a common example), I personally never found it all that useful.

What benefit do you see from such an indicator?

[nealrs]

Maybe it's a change in functionality? (new tab vs. new window) or perhaps it affects people's behavior (oh, this is another page on this site - so i won't be leaving / going somewhere else with potentially harmful info)

i don't have a concrete use case yet - but it seems like in a world rife with phishing / bad news / SEO blackhats - knowing if a link is external / internal could be useful.