wordle local storage nytimes redirect magic https://twitter.com/GalacticFurball/status/1492014062976188420

wordle_redir_2022_02_10.js

      const ls = window.localStorage;
      // Ensure we're always sending something
      let stringifiedData = '{}';
      // Default to production
      let url = 'https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle'

      // Don't attempt unless our user has local storage enabled
      if (ls) {
        const errors = [];
        const localData = {
          time: new Date().getTime(),
          statistics: null,
          darkTheme: null,
          colorBlindTheme: null,
        };

        // Allow QA folks to switch the redirect url
        const params = new Proxy(new URLSearchParams(window.location.search), {
          get: (searchParams, prop) => searchParams.get(prop),
        });
        if (params.url) url = params.url

        // Attempt to pull and parse the stats and themes
        try {
          localData.statistics = JSON.parse(ls.getItem('statistics'));
          localData.darkTheme = JSON.parse(ls.getItem('darkTheme'));
          localData.colorBlindTheme = JSON.parse(ls.getItem('colorBlindTheme'));
        } catch (e) {
          // Anything that's not valid JSON will not be sent
          errors.push(e);
        }

        try {
          stringifiedData = JSON.stringify(localData);
        } catch (e) {
          errors.push(e);
        }
      }
      
      // Everyone will redirect, regardless of local storage
      window.location.assign(`${url}?data=${stringifiedData}`)

wordle_redir_2022_02_11.js

      const ls = window.localStorage;
      // Ensure we're always sending something
      let stringifiedData = '{}';
      // Default to production
      let url = 'https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle'

      // Don't attempt unless our user has local storage enabled
      if (ls) {
        const errors = [];
        const localData = {
          time: new Date().getTime(),
          statistics: null,
          darkTheme: null,
          colorBlindTheme: null,
          force: true
        };

        // Attempt to pull and parse the stats and themes
        try {
          localData.statistics = JSON.parse(ls.getItem('statistics'));
          localData.darkTheme = JSON.parse(ls.getItem('darkTheme'));
          localData.colorBlindTheme = JSON.parse(ls.getItem('colorBlindTheme'));
        } catch (e) {
          // Anything that's not valid JSON will not be sent
          errors.push(e);
        }

        try {
          stringifiedData = JSON.stringify(localData);
        } catch (e) {
          errors.push(e);
        }
      }
      
      // Everyone will redirect, regardless of local storage
      window.location.assign(`${url}?data=${stringifiedData}`)

I remember hearing the creator talk about this on his appearance on the syntax.fm podcast. It's funny — when he brought it up, everybody immediately said it would have problems, and it turns out that it did! The better way to do this is probably to postMessage to a cross-domain iframe (with proper CORS).

there are two versions, as shortly after posting about this someone noticed the QA section was removed.