Disable the Printable version to avoid duplicate?

How do I stop the spiders from indexing the printable version of a thread? I am concerned about duplicate threads in the search engines. From what I can tell vBSEO version 3.1 allows the spiders to index the printable version of a thread correct?

Thanks for your help.

I take a slightly different approach myself.

• Disable in robots.txt
• Disable all vBSEO rewriting for printhread.php
• Remove printhread.php from server
• Open 'printthread' template and delete all contents and save
• Search and replace in templates for printthread.php - I believe that are 2 templates (one of which is showthread) where you will need to remove the link to printthread.php

It may be a little OCD, but better safe than sorry - works for me with zero printthread.php URL's indexed.

You don't really need a printable version these days anyway - when you can PDF a thread instead. Plus it's good to do your part to reduce carbon emissions and encourage your users to waste less paper, ink and electricity printing your threads - besides, with a printed copy (if they felt a need to print), users are unlikely to return to that thread again anyway (which isn't good for you).

Matthew - that sounds comprehensive, certainly redundant/OCD, and no doubt extremely effective!

Originally Posted by Mert Gökçeimam

Hello ,

I personally donot rewrite printable urls and block printthread.php within robots.txt

However vBSEO adds rel="nofollow" tags to print thread urls. Make sure you have the following setting set to Yes within vBSEO Control Panel

Add rel="nofollow" to the Printthread links?
Enable this option to prevent search engines from following links to Printthread. It is thought that printable versions of threads (printthread.php) may be considered "duplicate content" by search engines and possibly penalized or excluded.

I cant seem to find that option for printthread. These are the options I see in my vbseo control panel. I have them all set to yes.

Add rel="nofollow" to ALL Sorting Links
Enable this option to prevent search engines from following links to pages with the same content, but sorted differently. These pages might be tagged as "duplicate content". Therefore, we recommend enabling this feature.

Add rel="nofollow" to ALL Dynamic Pages
Enable this option to prevent search engines from following ALL dynamic links. Some examples are: 'Post Reply' links, 'Quote' links and 'Quick Reply' or 'Search' links. These pages have non-relevant (or "noise") content which should not be indexed by search engines , resulting in better SEO.

Add rel="nofollow" to Links pointing TO Member Profiles FROM Postbit
Enable this option to prevent search engines from following links to member profiles found in posts.

Add rel="nofollow" to Links pointing TO Member Profiles FROM Forumhome
Enable this option to prevent search engines from following links to member profiles found in your Forum Homepage.

Add rel="nofollow" to ALL External URLs
Enable this option to prevent search engines from following links to external pages (URLs that point to other domains).

i simply cannot find an advanced settings option. can you give me a better idea of where it is in the vbseo control panel? thanks

Originally Posted by Mert Gökçeimam

Please browse through URL Rewrite Settings within vBSEO Control Panel and couple lines below you'll see advanced settings

that only expands the rewrite settings. it dosent give me any more options for the nofollow section.

Originally Posted by Juan Muriente

There's nothing wrong with having Google give your member profiles some love. If you track your referral stats closely you'll see that some people are actually finding you while searching for usernames on the net, after all, 53% of webnauts do vanity searches on a daily basis .

And I don't think that the fact that search engine values this content will be a reason for "devaluing" your other content. Although I once heard a theory that supports the opposite.

I wouldn't stop spiders from indexing user profiles, much less now with the enhanced profiles in vB 3.7 that should encourage richer, more diverse content within those pages.

ok, i will let the spiders index them then.

thanks for your help.