[Bug]: Undiscovered communties go to a 404 page (redirect?)

[jordan1776]

Requirements

• Is this a bug report? For questions or discussions use https://lemmy.ml/c/lemmy_support
• Did you check to see if this issue already exists?
• Is this only a single bug? Do not put multiple bugs in one issue.
• Is this a server side (not related to the UI) issue? Use the Lemmy back end repo.

Summary

If I were to visit a community that hadn't been discovered by the instance I am on, I get an 404: couldnt_find_community error. To the average user, they might think that this community been blocked, inaccessible, or misspelled. For me to see this community I would need to copy it's !community@instance.com to the search of my instance, wait a moment, then click the link to it. Lemmy should be redirecting the links automatically so we don't have to through this convoluted process. I mark this a bug as 404 doesn't really describe what is going on.

What it should be doing is before it 404s, is check if the community exists by the same method as the search, give it like 3 seconds with maybe a little search waiting indicator, and finally go to that 0 subscriber community (or else give a page saying "this community doesn't exist" (and maybe even have a "If you have an account on {Instance} create a community {here}" if that instance allows for new communities to be made), There might be a cleaner solution but if a community exists, it should be accessible just by clicking a link.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Go to any instance.com/c/smallcommunity@otherinstance.com which hasn't been visited before by someone on that instance.
2. See 404

Technical Details

404: couldnt_find_community error

Version

0.17.4

Lemmy Instance URL

beehaw.org