Authors’ Links on Homepage Not Going to Author Post Pages

The code below is the correct code, in several different PHP files.
Currently need to know how to write it using the
the_author_posts_link();

<p class="postAuthor">By <a href="https://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/74001/<?php the_author_meta("user_url'); ?>"><?php the_author(); ?></a></p>

Just replace this:

<a href="https://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/74001/<?php the_author_meta("user_url'); ?>"><?php the_author(); ?></a>

With this:

<?php the_author_posts_link(); ?>

Alternately, you could use this:

<a href="https://wordpress.stackexchange.com/questions/74001/<?php echo get_author_posts_url(get_the_author_meta("ID' )); ?>"><?php the_author(); ?></a>

Codex references:

• the_author_posts_link()
• get_author_posts_url()
• get_the_author_meta()