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mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs

Posted by vitalka 
All files from this thread

File Name File Size   Posted by Date  
vv_urls.zip 1.8 KB open | download vitalka 11/01/2007 Read message
vv_urls.zip 1.9 KB open | download maciej.m 04/17/2008 Read message
mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
November 01, 2007 07:52PM
Well, the goal was to create really SEF URLs.

Mod provides the following URL pattern:
- sub-forum listing: http://site.com/index/forum-title,<forum-id>.html
- topic listing: http://site.com/list/forum-title,<forum-id>.html
- read message: http://site.com/read/topic-title,<forum-id>,<thread-id>,<message-id>.html

Inspired by sef_urls mod and uses some sort of its rewrite rules.

Developed by mineus for Holtzbrinck eLAB



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/04/2007 10:13AM by vitalka.
Attachments:
open | download - vv_urls.zip (1.8 KB)
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
November 04, 2007 11:02AM
I have downloaded the archive but can't find any instructions on how to implement this function. Any help would be appreciated.
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
November 04, 2007 06:35PM
1. Copy .htaccess to the root of your phorum installation
2. Copy contents of vv_urls folder to mods/vv_urls
3. Walk through .htaccess and *.php files, look for additional configuration according to your phorum.
4. Enable mod in admin panel
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
December 23, 2007 04:54PM
Hello,

This is the best SEO module for Phorum, but I have problem with it under 5.1.25 when I want to read message, because vv_urls.php do not transfer message title into URL, for example:

I have "Test Forum" with "Test Message" from default install,

when I click on Test Forum, URL is:

/list/test-forum,1.html - thats OK

then I click on Test Message, URL is:

/read/,1,1.html but correct is: /read/test-message,1,1.html

I don`t know how to repair it, please help.

Thanks Tomas Randa
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
January 09, 2008 08:55AM
This is a great initiative!

Unfortunately it does not work fully for me (it rewrites the links on the index page but when i click on them tI return to the index page - if you have an updated version for 5.2.6, feel free to let us know :)

I really love phorum in its speed, but 2 things are missing:
1. SE friendly URL's by default
2. A module that allows for automatic Sitemaps generation (www.sitemaps.org)

This is really needed to get better ranking in search engines. Without it, I think, phorum will have problems promoting its software to other users.
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
January 09, 2008 09:15AM
Google Sitemap:

don't these do what you need for that?
[www.phorum.org]
[www.phorum.org]

SEF URLs:

Search engine friendly URLs are considered user friendly URLs by me, because they often will show a bit better what is available inside a URL. I don't realy think that the big search engines still consider the URLs that important (since this is a holy war, discussion on it won't work; I just want to point out that believers of SEF URLs might be as right as I am on this). But even if it is that important, I see this as a typical module task and not a default Phorum task. Of course, if there were a very good and solid module for SEF URLs, we could include it as a core distributed mod. But that would require one that does not depend on rewrite rules in the server, because that is too server dependent.

One thing that I have been thinking about is writing a module that overrides the standard Phorum URL generation and replaces it with URLs that use a pathinfo solution. The module would write back those pathinfo URLs to Phorum parameters from the common_pre hook. That solution would work without special server rewriting configuration for all servers that support pathinfo (and most of them do nowadays as far as I know).


Maurice Makaay
Phorum Development Team
my blog linkedin profile secret sauce
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
January 09, 2008 05:17PM
Hi Mmakaay,

Thanks for your reaction. I stand corrected on the Google Sitemaps. Thanks for the suggested links. Those will do or provide enough basic information to make one myself (which I will share if I ever come around to making one).

About the SEF:

I do not want to start a holy war here ;) nor say you are wrong, because you are not wrong with the fact that user friendly urls are important. But at the same time search engine friendly urls are also very important for ranking (believe me, I know as an insider - sorry I can not say more about this). So simply said, why not make something that is both user and search engine friendly. For me as a user, I find phorum/{subforum-title}/{post-title).html more user friendly than phorum/read.php?10,341 and as a bonus it is also much more search engine friendly. Now this could be done on a mod level, but you see that a lot of web applications (like for example wordpress) comes with this standard enabled as part of the core code. So my first thought is, why not with such an excellent application like phorum?

Well, anyway these are just my 2cts. Thanks again for your reaction.
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
January 09, 2008 06:32PM
For that kind of URL schema, one probably needs to do more database lookups than are needed the default URL schema, since actual data from the forums and messages have to be included in it. Making it optional could be an option, but that would result in all kinds of code complication in the core. Doing one thing in core is always simpler and easier to manage than doing multiple different things.

Modules are perfect for overriding standard behavior of the Phorum core. There is absolutely no reason why SEF URLs cannot be implemented by means of a module. The module would cleanly contain all the code that is needed for implementing the different URL schema, without complicating the core. Multiple modules could even provide different SEF URL schemas (because there are different religions out there, opinions on what SEF URLs should look like differ between camps).

Why no core level support for SEF URLs? I hope the above sums that up. I get a feeling that you might not consider modules as a serious grown up part of a Phorum system, but as a way of applying patches and bandages. That is not the case. Modules (of course when well written) are as good as core code.

I promise you that I will write a SEF URL module to prove that I'm right about that last remark ;-)


Maurice Makaay
Phorum Development Team
my blog linkedin profile secret sauce
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
January 09, 2008 07:13PM
Thanks for the reaction and I understand the reasons/arguments you mention above.

Just to let you know, I do support the power that modules bring. However since the number of modules are so limited and they are often not updated that often (e.g. the two SEF modules in this forum are not compatible with the latest release of phorum, and even if they were there would be a problem with communicating the new SEF structure to, for example, the Sitemaps modules you mention above - by making this part of the core you could make it faster, more robust and provide one standard that would work better with the options to change the permalinks, like in wordpress - I hope this makes sense).

But I look forward to your modules to prove me wrong :) Thanks again for your great arguments :)
Re: mod: Really Search Engine Friendly URLs
January 09, 2008 07:17PM
PS to support this great software and your promise for a SEF module (and to see hopefully in the future more innovating ideas coming up on this site), I just donated $20 to get you guys to the MySQL conference. I know it is not a lot but its all I have right now and I hope it helps :)

Thanks again :)
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