kg-registry-product-url-update

name: kg-registry-product-url-update description: Use when updating the URL for a specific KG-Registry product, especially when the original URL is dead, redirected, versioned, or replaced by a newer canonical landing or download page.

kg-registry-product-url-update

Update a stale or incorrect product_url for a specific KG-Registry product while preserving the intended identity of the product.

Prerequisite

• Run this skill only from a local clone of the KG-Registry repository.
• The workflow depends on editing a local resource page, checking nearby metadata in the checked-out repository, and running local validation commands after the URL update.
• If the repository is not cloned locally, stop and clone it before attempting the update.

When to use

• The user asks to fix or update the URL for a named product.
• A product URL is dead, redirects somewhere unexpected, or no longer matches the intended product.
• The old URL pointed to a version-specific artifact, but only a newer or more general live URL is now available.
• A validation or review pass finds an outdated product link that needs curation judgment rather than a mechanical replacement.

Skip when:

• The whole resource page needs broad curation rather than a focused product URL repair.
• The product itself is mis-modeled and needs to be split, renamed, or re-categorized first.
• The task is about generated files under registry/ rather than source files under resource/.

Inputs

• Required: a specific product identifier, or a resource file plus enough detail to identify the target product.
• Preferred: the owning resource file under resource/<id>/<id>.md.

If multiple products in the same file could match, resolve the exact target before editing.

Workflow

1. Resolve the owning resource file and target product.

   • Find the resource page under resource/<id>/<id>.md.
   • Identify the exact product entry by id, name, description, or current product_url.
   • Read the surrounding product metadata before changing the URL.

2. Determine what the product is supposed to represent.

   • Use the product id, name, description, format, provenance, and any version fields to infer the intended artifact.
   • Distinguish between these common cases:
     • a stable landing page or portal
     • a versioned downloadable file
     • an API endpoint
     • a release directory or canonical "latest" location
   • Do not replace a URL blindly just because it is live. The replacement must still correspond to the same product concept.

3. Search for the best current live URL.

   • Expect web search to be necessary in many cases.
   • Start with authoritative sources: the resource homepage, official documentation, release notes, repository releases, download pages, API docs, and the hosting organization's site.
   • Use lightweight URL checks for candidate links when helpful, but prefer human-readable confirmation from official pages over status-code checking alone.
   • Treat redirects carefully. A redirect to a generic homepage may be less accurate than a stable download or release page.

4. Choose the replacement URL based on product identity, not only string similarity.

   • Prefer the closest live URL that still represents the same product.
   • If the old URL pointed to a specific version and that exact version is gone, a URL for the current version or canonical latest-download page can be acceptable.
   • If only a broader landing page remains, use it only when it is the best stable path to the same product and the file-specific URL no longer exists.
   • If the replacement materially changes what the product represents, stop and reconsider whether the product metadata itself also needs updating.

5. Update nearby metadata when the URL change implies it.

   • If the new URL clearly points to a newer version, update latest_version or version-related description text when supported by evidence.
   • If the product is now accessed through a landing page rather than a direct file, make sure the description still accurately explains what the user reaches there.
   • Update the parent resource's last_modified_date to today, since a product URL change is still a curation edit to the resource page.
   • Preserve existing provenance unless the source relationship itself has changed.
   • Do not rewrite unrelated parts of the resource page.

6. Validate the result.

   • After editing, consult the kg-registry-validation skill.
   • Run:

     uv run make validate-file FILE=resource/<id>/<id>.md
     

   • If formatting drifted, run prettify first and validate again.

Heuristics

• Prefer official current URLs over mirrors unless the mirror is already the established product host.
• Prefer durable landing pages over brittle deep links when the deep link no longer exists.
• Prefer DOI or stable release URLs when they truly identify the same product release.
• Prefer canonical latest/ endpoints only when the product is conceptually "current release" rather than a frozen historical version.
• If the old product was explicitly version-specific and only a new-version URL exists, keep the product only if the product description already tolerates that semantic shift or can be updated narrowly and truthfully.

Common mistakes

• Replacing a dead URL with the resource homepage even though a more specific product page still exists.
• Updating the URL to a different product just because its filename looks similar.
• Treating any HTTP 200 response as sufficient evidence that the link is correct.
• Keeping stale version-specific description text after changing the URL to a newer release.
• Changing provenance fields when only the access URL changed.

Relationship to other skills

• kg-registry-curation covers broader resource-page editing.
• kg-registry-validation should be used after the URL update to validate the edited file.