# Why post\_number?

**URL:** <https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-post-number/52634>\
**Category:** Development\
**Created:** [November 7, 2016, 7:33pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-post-number/52634 "2016-11-07T19:33:26Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 7

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**Author:** ![sam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/sam/32/102149_2.png) [@sam](https://meta.discourse.org/u/sam)\
**Post date:** [November 8, 2016, 3:09am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-post-number/52634/7 "2016-11-08T03:09:34Z")

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> [@Kevin\_Wildenradt](#):
>
> How would post\_id not work for this scenario? It would seem that if 2 is deleted, the third post would become the second post, but its post\_number does not change accordingly and is now wrong.

The post number is correct now, cause external links continue to work. If we ever renumbered links would break which would be terrible.

(post number, topic\_id) is an alias for (post\_id) which is used to keep urls looking just right.

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_[View the full topic](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-post-number/52634)._