We're Here to Help

At JfamStory, support means more than answering questions — it’s our promise that you can rely on our tools every day, on every device, with confidence. This page explains how to get help, how we triage and resolve issues, what information speeds up responses, and the principles that guide our support for URL conversion features like encoding/decoding, QR generation, and short links. Everything here is focused on helping you solve problems quickly while protecting your privacy and time.

Our Support Philosophy

We design our support around three principles: clarity, privacy, and speed. Clarity means we give actionable steps — not vague suggestions. Privacy means we avoid collecting unnecessary data and keep all sensitive content on your device whenever possible. Speed means we prioritize issues that block workflows and respond with workarounds when a full fix requires more time. Our aim is for you to spend less time troubleshooting and more time shipping.

How to Reach Us

The fastest way to contact us is through the Contact page. Include a descriptive subject (for example, “URL Decoder returns plus signs instead of spaces”) and a brief summary of the context. We typically respond within 24–48 hours on business days (KST). For urgent breakages affecting production campaigns, mark your message “urgent” so we can prioritize it.

What to Include for Faster Resolution

Quality details dramatically shorten resolution time. When possible, include:

• Tool & action: e.g., “URL Encoder → Encode” or “URL to QR → Generate”.
• Exact input (sanitized): Share a minimal, non-sensitive example string or URL that reproduces the issue.
• Expected vs actual result: Tell us what you expected and what you observed (including any error text).
• Environment: Browser (Chrome/Firefox/Safari/Edge), version, OS (Windows/macOS/Linux/iOS/Android), and whether it’s mobile or desktop.
• Steps to reproduce: A numbered list from page open to the final click.
• Screenshots: If safe, attach a screenshot with sensitive data redacted.

Self-Help Troubleshooting Checklist

Try these standard checks before opening a ticket — in many cases they resolve issues immediately:

• Hard refresh: Press Ctrl/⌘ + Shift + R to reload assets in case of a stale cache.
• Private window: Open the tool in an incognito/private window to rule out extension conflicts.
• Different browser: Test once on another browser to see if the problem is engine-specific.
• Minimal input: Reproduce with the smallest possible URL or text to isolate the character/segment that fails.
• Network independence: If you’re behind a corporate proxy/VPN, try a normal network to rule out rewriting or filtering.

Tool-Specific Guides & Pitfalls

Below are common questions and quick fixes across our tools.

URL Encoder / Decoder

• Space vs plus: In application/x-www-form-urlencoded contexts, spaces become +. For generic URLs, spaces should be %20. If your decoded text shows + instead of a space, you’re likely applying generic decoding to form-encoded data. Switch decoding mode or replace + with space only in form context.
• Double encoding: If you see sequences like %252F, your input was encoded twice. Decode once, check for %25 (the percent sign itself), then decode again if needed.
• Reserved characters in paths: Slashes inside a value should be %2F to avoid accidentally splitting path segments.
• Unicode & emoji: Ensure the receiving system expects UTF-8; if it doesn’t, non-ASCII characters may render as question marks or mojibake.

URL to QR

• QR unreadable on print: Increase size and contrast; avoid compressing QR images too aggressively in PDFs or slides.
• Long URLs: If a QR contains a very long URL, consider using a short link first for improved scan reliability in low-quality prints.
• Error correction: For environments with glare or scuffs, higher error-correction levels increase resilience (with a slight density trade-off).

Shortener

• UTM integrity: Always encode inner parameter values before building the final short link. Mis-encoded ampersands (&) are the top cause of broken redirects.
• Redirect loops: If a short link redirects to a URL that creates a loop (e.g., back into another shortener), resolve the target to its final form first.
• Testing regions: Some social/enterprise apps wrap outbound links. Test short links both inside and outside those apps.

Accessibility & Inclusive Support

We want our tools to work for everyone. If you use screen readers, keyboard navigation, or high-contrast themes and encounter obstacles, please describe the element (e.g., “the Encode button”) and what happens (e.g., “not reachable with Tab”). We treat accessibility bugs as high-priority and welcome suggestions on ARIA labels, focus order, and contrast.

Privacy-First Support

Wherever possible, our tools process data locally in your browser. When you ask for help, avoid sending sensitive URLs or personal data. If a private example is necessary, redact tokens/domains and share only the segment that reproduces the issue (for instance, replace a real domain with example.com and tokens with ***). We will never ask for credentials, 2FA codes, or account passwords.

Status, Incidents, and Maintenance

If something breaks for many users at once (for example, a CDN cache issue), we treat it as an incident. During incidents, our priority is (1) provide a workaround, (2) restore normal behavior, and (3) publish a short post-mortem that explains what happened and what we changed to prevent regression. Minor UI fixes may deploy silently; breaking changes always ship with a note in the changelog or FAQ.

Feature Requests & Roadmap

Support isn’t just for bugs — it’s also where new ideas begin. If you’re missing a capability (batch conversions, additional encodings, export options, etc.), send us your use case, not just the feature name. Explain the job to be done, typical input size, and where the result goes (browser, spreadsheet, backend). Concrete details help us design a solution that works across scenarios and devices.

Enterprise, Education, and Teams

If you support a team that relies on consistent output for analytics or compliance, tell us about your constraints (naming conventions, length limits, logging policies). We can suggest guardrails such as parameter linting, safe defaults, and copy-ready templates. For classes and workshops, we can share printable one-pagers that summarize encoding rules and common pitfalls for beginners.

Known Edge Cases

• Legacy encodings: Some legacy systems still expect non-UTF-8 encodings. If your target decodes incorrectly, verify its expected charset and convert accordingly before building the URL.
• Very long query strings: Certain stacks start to fail around ~2,000 characters. Move bulky data to POST bodies (when appropriate) or use a short link to reduce length.
• App wrappers: In-app browsers sometimes modify headers or block new windows. Open links in an external browser to compare behavior.

Triage & Resolution Process

We categorize each report as: blocker (can’t complete core task), degraded (works with cumbersome steps), or minor (cosmetic or low-frequency). Blockers get immediate attention; degraded issues get prioritized based on impact; minor issues are batched into maintenance sprints. If we can’t reproduce immediately, we’ll ask for a minimal example and environment details, then keep you updated until we close the loop.

Sample Report Template

Copy and adapt the template below when contacting us:

Tool/Action: URL Decoder → Decode
Input (sanitized): https://example.com/search?q=a+b
Expected: Plus sign remains "+"
Actual: Space is shown instead of "+"
Steps:
1) Open URL Decoder
2) Paste the URL above
3) Click Decode
4) Observe "a b" instead of "a+b"
Environment: Chrome 124, macOS 14.5, desktop
Screenshots: (attached, tokens redacted)

Security Notes for Support

• No credentials ever: We will never request your passwords, 2FA codes, API keys, or session cookies.
• Minimal data principle: Share only what’s essential to reproduce the bug; redact everything else.
• Phishing awareness: Always verify that replies originate from our official domain before clicking links.

Internationalization & Localization

If you run into locale-specific behaviors — for example, differences in how keyboards input certain punctuation or how fonts display encoded text — let us know your language/locale. We’re actively improving the experience across languages and welcome reports about right-to-left layouts, CJK input nuances, and emoji rendering differences.

Common Questions (Support-Focused)

• “Can I send a full production URL?” We recommend you don’t. Create a minimal test case that behaves the same but contains no sensitive data.
• “Do you keep logs of my inputs?” Tools operate locally in your browser; we don’t retain your content. If you email us, we keep only the message thread necessary to resolve your issue.
• “How do I know when an issue is fixed?” We’ll reply to your thread and, for larger items, note it in the FAQ or a short changelog entry.
• “Can you review my campaign links?” We can review structure and encoding patterns (not campaign strategy). Send examples with tokens and private IDs redacted.

Best Practices Cheat Sheet

• Encode parameter values individually (not the entire URL) unless nesting a full URL as a value.
• Remember the difference between %20 (space) and + (form-encoded space).
• For path segments, encode reserved characters like / as %2F when used literally.
• Normalize and lint UTM parameters to avoid analytics fragmentation.
• When something looks double-encoded, search for %25 and decode one layer at a time.

Working With Screenshots & Videos

Screenshots with the address bar and the tool pane visible are often enough to diagnose issues. If you record a short video (no audio needed), show the exact steps quickly — open the page, paste input, click the action, and reveal the result. Blur or cover any private data before sharing.

Staying Informed

We occasionally add small UI enhancements or fix corner cases that don’t warrant a full blog post. To keep up, check the FAQ periodically for “What’s new” notes. If you requested a feature, we’ll reply directly when it ships or if we need more detail to shape the design.

Thank You

Every message you send helps make JfamStory better for everyone. Whether you’re unblocking a critical marketing launch, teaching newcomers about the web, or trimming friction from a daily workflow, we’re in your corner. If you’ve read this far and still aren’t sure what to include, just send a short note describing what you were trying to do and what went wrong — we’ll meet you where you are and take it from there.