Shorten URLs automatically for text messages and iCal feeds

I would like text notifications that are sent out to have the URL automatically shortened like you can do through bit.ly. Right now it displays the entire URL, but a shortened one would be better for text messages so it doesn't use all our characters.

  • Guest
  • Aug 27 2015
  • Under consideration
  • Jan 27, 2017

    Admin response

    This is something we'd like to offer in the future. We don't have a timeline yet and it's not on the roadmap, but this is something we're hoping to accomplish at some point.

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  • Amanda Polson commented
    March 01, 2023 14:13

    How is this still not fixed?! We don't have the budget for a third party texting service, tried to use the bb messages and it didnt even split the link, it just truncated it which makes it totally useless!

  • Tina Pappas commented
    October 04, 2021 19:23

    We've ramped up our text notifications and just found out that links are being cut off and split across multiple messages. There's gotta be a way to use bitly or something like that to shorten the URLs.

  • Guest commented
    September 10, 2019 14:32

    OK--it's late 2019, and this still hasn't been fixed yet. We encourage our families to use text notifications, but they're worthless when the URLs are so long and they split across multiple text messages. This really needs to be fixed--I don't think any other notification system I use does this.

  • Guest commented
    November 16, 2017 18:20

    I don't understand how a shortened URL isnt being used in the first place.  We just posted an Announcement and it texted our parents a link that was 82 characters long that got split between multiple texts so it doesn't work.  Seriously, it's 2017, how are you not using a shortened URL?

  • Julie Farr commented
    August 31, 2017 16:58

    Agree!  We moved the url to the first position in the message but not ideal

  • Guest commented
    May 17, 2017 19:42

    I just posted an announcement and the message was split into parts on my phone due to the length of the title and the URL. This ended up cutting the URL between the two messages, and it caused an error for anyone who clicked on the link in the announcement.

  • Peter DiDonato commented
    September 15, 2016 20:01

    Agree. This seems like basic functionality that should be baked in. Also agree that [schoolname@schoolnotifications.org] is a waste of valuable characters.

  • Guest commented
    November 11, 2015 15:38

    Additionally, the text message includes [schoolname@schoolnotifications.org] which also significantly takes away from available characters for the text message. This problem should be addressed immediately.

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