Urls rewriting "how to" with .htaccess
-
hi,
Please i would need advices (links, tips, tool:generator ?) regarding url rewriting through .htaccess (newbee about it).
It's a "refurbishing" website case , the domain doesn't change. But the CMS does !
I've got a list of urls (800) with which i don't want to loose rankings on :
Here the type of old url syntax :
http://www.mydomain.com/home/newscontent.asp?id=1133
Here the new url type would be:
http://www.mydomain.com/name-of-the-article
or/and
http://www.mydomain.com/category/Page-2Tks a lot...
-
You should get all the url of the old site with Xenu's Link Sleuth, then create a PHP array of oldUrl => newUrl and put it in your redirect script.
So you have in the htaccess :
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/home/newscontent.asp
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} id=([0-9]+)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ redirect.php?id=%1 [L]In the redirect.php file, you have :
$redirect = array("/home/newscontent.asp?id=1133" => "/name-of-the-article"); // 800 times (for all url)
if(isset($redirect[$_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']])) {
header("Status: 301 Moved Permanently", false, 301);
header("Location: http://www.mydomain.com/".$redirect[$_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']]);
exit();
}// Send a 404 if you don't have a redirect
-
Hi, i was thinking of the whole picture of baptiste solution, you say :
"Baptiste: On the new linux hosting set up an .htaccess file in the root of the site directory that redirects all id=xxxx requests to a redirect.php file on your server. The redirect.php file will need to interrogate a database with a table of the mappings and automatically redirect to the correct page via php scripting."
it means that wiithout any credentials, any database access, if you have urls from the site you need to move to, you can redirect any urls site to another one !?
Hum..i think i miss something ..
-
Good idea..i'll to make it so , and use excel function.....tks
-
Many tks for all these explanations..
So, in fact, lazily speaking, i would say that the .htaccess file solution give less work to do (no redirection script) and seems to be quite easy to make (excepting syntax inside .htaccess), so i 'll go for Damien's ..but i need credentials to install it.
Otherwise, if i don't, I'd go for Baptiste's...
Tks a lot...
-
As you have only 800 urls, I agree with Damien, you should generate an associative array in pure php, associating every ID with the new url.
The redirect script will only test if the ID is an array key, if it is you 301 to the new url. Otherwise, display a 404 page.
-
OK in that case it simplifies things a bit.
In order to do any redirection from id=1136 to unique-article-name you will haveto create the mappings entirely manually.
The two solutions provided are:
Baptiste: On the new linux hosting set up an .htaccess file in the root of the site directory that redirects all id=xxxx requests to a redirect.php file on your server. The redirect.php file will need to interrogate a database with a table of the mappings and automatically redirect to the correct page via php scripting.Mine: essentially the same as Baptiste's proposal, except that you don't interrogate the database, all the redirections are done using the htaccess file which contains all the mappings.
Either way you will need to manually create the mappings yourself, either in the database or in the htaccess file.
EDIT: Just had a thought, are the page titles of the articles the same between the new site and the old? If they are then you could crawl both sites with Xenu and then use vlookups in excel (or similar) to semi-automatically create your mapping of id = unique-article-name.
-
I'd say yes for the first one and for sure no for the second one...:)
-
To be honest, this is the solution I'd go for.
Mozollo, was your old site database driven?
Are you using the old article titles as the new page names?
If the answer is no to either of these, then the end result is you will have to manual map id to page name for each of the 800 pages you want to keep.
-
Tks again, so (sorry to repeat)
-
your solution : 1 .htaccess + redirect.php : located at the root of windows platform
-
Damien's : 1 .htaccess :located at the root of windows platform
Is that correct ?
-
-
1. .htaccess won't exist on the windows platform unless you installed a rewrite mod on the windows server. If you did then the .htaccesswill be in the root folder of the website (usually) you should check the documentation of the rewrite mod to confirm that.
2. If you have a windows PC then Xenu's Link Sleuth should be able to crawl the old site, you can then extract the information from the files that xenu can export.
3/4. If every unique id needs to get mapped to a unique url then yes, 800 times it is. If you have multiple ids that go to the same page you could do:
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^id=113[3-8]$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^newscontent.asp$ ^name-of-the-article$ [L,R=301]
All ids from 1133 to 1138 will now redirect to the same page, you'll have to work out the regexs though.
-
To be clear about the different roles of the files in my solution, the .htaccess file will redirect every old url (whatever the id is) to a redirect script written in php.
This script will get the old url Id, load the article (to get the article name) and then redirect 301 to the new url. Only in php can you access the database.
Damien gave another solution, only based on htaccess. You have to write (or generate with code / software) 800 redirect directive for the htaccess file.
-
Tks to you both Baptiste placé Damiens Phillips and.
What do you mean when you say :
"The redirect.php file will load the article (or category as I understood) and do a 301 to the new url."
Is it en .htaccess file to create or a dedicated file.php , or both (redirect.php) ?
Yes, i'll all have to transfer each old article and i'll give them an unique urls per article..hope that reply your question !
-
Can you be a bit more precise about the new url ? Does every old article with id has to 301 to a page with a unique name ?
-
Hi,
Tks to you both Damiens Phillips and Baptiste placé.
But it seems to be a bit confusing for me for 2 reasons : language + technical knowledge !
I confirm that i'll move from windows platform to linux one.So if i understand :
1/ - htaccess is possible but where will it be located ? I assume at the root of the old platform (windows here..).
2/ - I'll have to crawl each article in order to get each id (by the way, have you got any crawler tool to advise ?)
3/ - For each of these urls i'll have to write such syntax :
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^id=1133$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^newscontent.asp$ ^name-of-the-article$ [L,R=301]4/ ...800 times ? Or is there a way to tell on 1 line like :
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^id=1133$ + ^id=1134$ + ^id=1197$ ...... [NC]Tks a lot again
-
I'll return the favour if it turns out he has moved from IIS
-
That's right but htaccess was asked. Thumbed up your answer so it goes first
-
But only if he's moved from Windows IIS hosting to Linux or Windows + PHP!
-
True ! The good syntax is :
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} ^/home/newscontent.asp
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} id=([0-9]+)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ redirect.php?id=%1 [L] -
He'll need to add [L,R=301] at the end instead of just [L]. IIRC default behaviour is a 302 redirect.
You also can't reference a querystring in the RewriteRule, you have to use RewriteCond.
-
Hi,
From the .asp in the sample URLs I'm guessing you're hosted on Windows, if that's the case you'll need to get a rewrite mod for IIS such as ISAPI Rewrite 3. We've been using it for about 5 years now and it performs well. Their site has documentation that shows how it works.
You'll need to learn about regex expressions and a tool like Regex Buddy might be helpful.
I'm not aware of an tools that can automate generation, and I think that in your case you're going to need to do some manual work to set it up.
First you'll need a way of linking the old URLs to the new ones. Given the information you've provided, it's not clear how you'll be able to do this, so I'll make an assumption.
Assuming that name-of-the-article is the same as the title of newscontent.asp?id=1133, you'll need to generate a list, in excel for example, that lists the old contentid and the title of that document. You can then use formulae/macros to generate the rewrite rules which you would enter in the .htaccess file.
If you don't have a record of the id = title relationship in your old cms database (assumption!) then you might be able to do it by crawling the old site with a crawling program, exporting the data and then manipulating it. Otherwise you'll have to do it all by hand.
Rewrite rules generally take the form:
RewriteRule oldpageaddress newpageaddress [flags]
You'll also need to use the RewriteCond in order to base the rule on the querystring.
So for your example;
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} ^id=1133$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^newscontent.asp$ ^name-of-the-article$ [L,R=301]
You'd then need to repeat those two statements for each page you want to redirect.
-
Hi mozllo,
You won't be able to create a .htaccess for such urls, because the original url only has the ID of the article and you want the name of the article in the new url. This requires database access to know the new url.
I would suggest to put in your htaccess file :
RewriteRule ^home/newscotnent.asp?id=([0-9]+) redirect.php?id=$1 [L]
Edit : see good rule below
The redirect.php file will load the article (or category as I understood) and do a 301 to the new url.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Linkbuild on 'new' or 'old' url?
Hi, I'm trying to rank for a keyword. For the last year and 4 months the rank hasn't changed much. It stays on the 3th page. Within this period the rank has first gone down and then up. Three months ago I started doing linkbuilding for the url the keyword was linked to. This is a main category page. Lately, I don't know when exactly I've discovered that the keyword is ranking for a different url, a product category of these items for 1 brand. I'm wondering if it's wise to shift my focus and start using the 'new' url for linkbuilding? The 'old' url isn't in the top 100 for the keyword. However, if you search for the url in Google, it shows up. And, if I'm advised to shift my focus to the 'new' url, is it advisable to go back and change the backlinks to the 'new' url? A question related to the above one, is there another tool like Open Site Explorer which shows you an overview of the backlinks directing to a deeplink? Like MajestickSEO. I'm trying to get the most extensive overview possible. Thanks in advance.
Link Building | | anubis20 -
Buying keyword urls for local traffic
Hi, I've been told that there is a real benefit in buying up local domain names and setting up mini adverts to your core website... is this actually true? Seems a strange practice. Example: If I had a car cleaning site called 'MozCarCleaning.co.uk' and the company was based in London. Then I'd buy related domains, 'LondonCarCleaning.co.uk' , 'CarValetLondon.co.uk' and make mini websites which then link to the main site. Alternatively, would it be worth just 301 redirecting directly to the core site? Thanks.
Link Building | | MatthewJamesRiley0 -
"New" Digg - SEO benefits?
Quick question for the group - I've not used the new Digg. Does it have SEO benefits? I wasn't sure if Google counted these or not. thanks
Link Building | | yandl0 -
Why don't some external links "count"?
A car-dealer client advertises through DexKnows, and the entry includes a link to the client's website. That link is not listed as a linking domain through OpenSite Explorer for the client's site. A competing car dealer also advertises through DexKnows, but that link is counted as a linking domain for the competitor. Why the difference? (I'm new and still learning -- linkbuilding appears to be my weakness.) Thank you!
Link Building | | TheOptimizer690 -
Example of a local "boring-niche" site in a relatively high competition area using strictly white hat tactics
I'm looking for an example of a site in a very boring service niche locally "let's say elevator doors in chicago" or something like that, that successfully using blogging, content generation, etc to achieve top rankings above its spammy competitors. Anyone care to give out a case study? I'm not talking about companies that submit to 100's of local directories like yelp, or google maps rankings. I'm talking about organic or blended serps.
Link Building | | ilyaelbert0 -
"Links" page Value?
I was wondering, Is there any value in these days to advice clients to create LINK US or LINKS page with bunch of reciprocal links on it and solely for link exchange, I remember reading somewhere that, it is little useless in terms for ranking nowadays? Am I right? Thanks!
Link Building | | DigitalJungle0 -
Are In bound links to a Custom URL ineffective
Hi All, I would like to know what would achieve the best inbound link ranking from google. I have to run an inbound link campaign and have to choose between two options: Option 1, get people to link directly to the home page or Option 2, get people to link to a custom url (for example, www.domain.com/index.aspx?dealer1455) the custom url has a function to hide certain menu items on the home page. Also The custom url ID number will also change for each person that links to us. So in effect each link is directed to an individual custom URL. My preference is option 1. But a number of the people linking to us would prefer to link to a custom home page that has their competitors details hidden. At the end of the day the decision needs to be made on what will provide our site with the best rankings in the serps What option is best to improve search engine rankings ? Many Thanks in advance
Link Building | | SaimanRhino0 -
What to do when a Bad URL has to stay?
I am working with a friend on optimizing a site that has a troublesome set of issues. The company has integrated some ERP system that cannot be changed or removed and it is creating goofy URL's. So my question is which URL do I build links to? the www.xxx.com or the crazy URL that it is being redirected to. Site URL: www.nauticalchartsonline.com
Link Building | | Boogily
redirect: http://www.nauticalchartsonline.com/n.c/NauticalChartsOnline.html I would greatly appreciate constructive feedback.. Thanks, Jeannie0