Sitemaps. When compressed do you use the .gz file format or the (untidy looking, IMHO) .xml.gz format?

[NoisyLittleMonkey]

When submitting compressed sitemaps to Google I normally use the a file named sitemap.gz

A customer is banging on that his web guy says that sitemap.xml.gz is a better format.

Google spiders sitemap.gz just fine and in Webmaster Tools everything looks OK...

Interested to know other SEOmoz Pro's preferences here and also to check I haven't made an error that is going to bite me in the ass soon!

Over to you.

[NoisyLittleMonkey]

Thanks Big Bazza... I like the 'better' vs 'accepted' reasoning. Not too confrontational

[Hurf]

Generally the .xml.gz format is the one stated in examples there are a few references to this here : http://www.sitemaps.org/protocol.php#index

Most sitemap generators that create both compressed and uncompressed sitemap files name them sitemap.xml and sitemap.xml.gz respectively. It also makes it clearer what the content of the zipped file is. I don't believe it is essential however, as you will direct tools such as google.com/webmasters to your xml sitemap - rather than expect it to find it of its own accord.

I always use the .xml.gz format when compressing. I would argue that (if both formats work) neither one is 'BETTER' than the other, rather one is more ACCEPTED than the other.