Is there a way to see incoming links to anchors?

[Sam Sosnowski]

My company's Confluence uses anchor functionality quite regularly to jump to specific headings within other pages by using the Advanced linking tab and typing the "Page Name#anchor_name". 

Is there a way to see a list of incoming links an anchor has? This would be a useful feature to ensure no one edits/removes an anchor and loses functionality from other locations, but as of now I can't see a way to do so.

[Bill Bailey · Accepted solution]

Generally no, as anchors are using a standard HTML construct, versus some sort of client side code. In other words, they are static construct where the link knows about the anchor, but not vice versa. Either can exist without the other existing.

[David at David Simpson Apps · Accepted solution]

That’s going to be a little tricky, but adding Google Analytics to your system should help as it can catch the #heading_id within the URL. 

Of course there’s an app for that on Atlassian Marketplace (and I’m the vendor). 

It’s still going to be a little convoluted to find what you’re after as this is quite a niche requirement. 

I'm happy to help if you wish to explore this further.