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I would like to add my Google+ Profile custom URL to my Stack Exchange profiles. It includes a character with diacritics that is automatically removed.

The URL alone in the Bio doesn't work either.

https://plus.google.com/+RubénRivera

In the meantime, in the website box I replaced the URL that I want to use with the one with the serial number:

https://plus.google.com/113074074636564187023

Ideas for implementation

  1. Add a special box for Google+ Custom URL in the same way that there is a special box for the Twitter link or Username.
  2. Add a "special" markdown for Google+ Custom URL so SE platform has enough context.
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You need to provide a valid URL; your browser is a lot more tolerant about what characters it accepts, but when I copy the URL from the Chrome location bar I get the real URL:

https://plus.google.com/+Rub%C3%A9nRivera

Note the %C3 and %A9 parts; those are UTF-8 bytes encoded using URL percent encoding. The C3 A9 bytes encode a é character.

Using the URL with percent encoding works fine.

Note that Stack Exchange cannot accept 'human readable' URLs because there is no standard encoding to be used. Google+ uses UTF-8, as do a lot of sites, but there is no RFC specification to state what encoding to use here. See What every web developer must know about URL encoding. A lone URL doesn't provide enough context for Stack Exchange to determine the correct codec to use.

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  • Using your words, the feature-request is that SE profile be more tolerant so the custom URL links could be "human readable".
    – Rubén
    Commented May 15, 2015 at 21:18
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    Idea from the answer: where markdown is allowed, the custom URL could be displayed as follow https://plus.google.com/+RubénRivera. Use custom URL between [ and ] and encoded / valid URL between ( and ).
    – Rubén
    Commented May 15, 2015 at 21:21
  • @Rubén: the problem there is that not all sites use UTF-8 to encode non-ASCII codepoints.
    – Martijn Pieters
    Commented May 15, 2015 at 21:24
  • A feature request could be a wish, a hope, a desire... Don't you think?
    – Rubén
    Commented May 15, 2015 at 21:28
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    "A lone URL doesn't provide enough context..." Then add something else to the SE platform so its users could add the required context :)
    – Rubén
    Commented May 15, 2015 at 23:38
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    UTF-8 is the one true encoding. Any claim of the existence of of other encodings is a lie.
    – Jeremy
    Commented May 16, 2015 at 1:30
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    @JeremyBanks: Oh how I wish that were true.
    – Nathan Tuggy
    Commented May 16, 2015 at 5:36

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