# Oneboxing not working when starting a topic with pre-filled information
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/oneboxing-not-working-when-starting-a-topic-with-pre-filled-information/272797
**Category:** Support
**Tags:** onebox
**Created:** [July 25, 2023, 5:53pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/oneboxing-not-working-when-starting-a-topic-with-pre-filled-information/272797 "2023-07-25T17:53:17Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@ethang](https://meta.discourse.org/u/ethang)
#### Post date: [July 25, 2023, 5:53pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/oneboxing-not-working-when-starting-a-topic-with-pre-filled-information/272797/1 "2023-07-25T17:53:17Z")
The documentation on [Create a link to start a new topic with pre-filled information](https://meta.discourse.org/t/create-a-link-to-start-a-new-topic-with-pre-filled-information/28074) says:
> [@Creating a link to start a new topic with pre-filled information](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-a-link-to-start-a-new-topic-with-pre-filled-information/28074/1):
>
> This feature also supports “[Start a topic by pasting a link (like Reddit)](https://meta.discourse.org/t/start-a-topic-by-pasting-a-link-like-reddit/54071)”, provided that the body is not present, for example:
>
> `https://meta.discourse.org/new-topic?title=https://www.xkcd.com/556`
However, even when directly copy-pasting the listed example, a redirect appears to strip one of the slashes from the URL specified after `title=` , resulting in the browser instead navigating to `https://meta.discourse.org/new-topic?title=https:/www.xkcd.com/556` which opens a composer window for a new topic with the pre-filled title `https:/www.xkcd.com/556`. The behavior and oneboxing described in [Start a topic by pasting a link (like Reddit)](https://meta.discourse.org/t/start-a-topic-by-pasting-a-link-like-reddit/54071) then obviously doesn’t occur, unless you manually add another `/` back in to the title URL.
I first saw this behavior trying things out on my hosted Discourse and figured I might have something mis-configured, but then seems like a bug since it also happens with the provided example?
---
### Author:  [@Falco](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Falco)
#### Post date: [July 25, 2023, 6:00pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/oneboxing-not-working-when-starting-a-topic-with-pre-filled-information/272797/2 "2023-07-25T18:00:28Z")
IMO you are expected to encode any query unsafe query params,
> [@Creating a link to start a new topic with pre-filled information](https://meta.discourse.org/t/creating-a-link-to-start-a-new-topic-with-pre-filled-information/28074/1):
>
> you can use w3Schools’s [HTML URL Encoding Reference](https://www.w3schools.com/tags/ref_urlencode.ASP) to find what text characters are encoded as in the URL, there is even a text to URL converter in the `Try It Yourself` section in the page linked above in this paragraph.
so
`https://meta.discourse.org/new-topic?title=https://www.xkcd.com/556`
becomes
`https://meta.discourse.org/new-topic?title=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.xkcd.com%2F556`
that works like [Discourse Meta](https://meta.discourse.org/new-topic?title=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.xkcd.com%2F556) (open in a new tab)
---
### Author:  [@ethang](https://meta.discourse.org/u/ethang)
#### Post date: [July 25, 2023, 7:23pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/oneboxing-not-working-when-starting-a-topic-with-pre-filled-information/272797/3 "2023-07-25T19:23:54Z")
ah! thank you, I would suggest the example be clarified but can proceed from here. Much appreciated!
---
### Author:  [@Canapin](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Canapin)
#### Post date: [July 26, 2023, 7:45am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/oneboxing-not-working-when-starting-a-topic-with-pre-filled-information/272797/4 "2023-07-26T07:45:56Z")
I’ve added this info on the guide, thanks! 🤝