Permalinks

Hello guys,

I have set-up my blog, but I have some questions regarding permalinks.

Currently I am using the “?p=123” type of links but I want to change it to “2009/01/sample-post/” .

Therefore my links of my articles are listed on many websites , and I want to ask if after changing the permalinks the old links will still work and link correctly to articles

If they won’t link correctly is there any way fixing this? At least making the links redirect? – not directly linking to my articles.

I hope someone can help me out. Thanks.