How to prevent Forum Search.php pages from being indexed?

[Swank]

Hi everyone,

I have installed vbseo about 5 days ago and right now it has only indexed urls like /forums/sitemap/, /forums/sitemap/f-9.html , /forums/sitemap/calender.php, /forums/search.php?do=getdaily&contenttype=vBForum_Post while all the good posts, threads pages are not indexed yet..its funny how Google indexed the useless pages like calender and search pages when there are better content to index lol. This is a pretty new forum with over 25 posts, not a new site though as main site has been around for over 6 months and has been indexed very well, main site on wordpress.

I have a quick question, I noticed Google indexed /forums/search.php?do=getdaily&contenttype=vBForum_Post which turns out to give an error message on page load: "Sorry - no matches. Please try some different terms."

Is there any way I can prevent Google from indexing those search query pages? Thanks for every help given!

[Andrés Durán Hewitt]

Hello,

You should consider making a robots.txt file for your site:

Tutorial how to make a good robots.txt file

And also adding to your sitemaps the valuable content.

vBSEO Sitemap Generator : Quality vs Quantity

[Swank]

Hi Andres, thank you for the super fast reply! Just another quick question as I read through the threads above, is /forums/sitemap/ and /forums/sitemap/f-9.html necessary to be indexed? Or should I block all instances of /forums/sitemap/ from being indexed all together in robots.txt?

[Swank]

Also, I got into Permalinks page on vbseocp and I don't see the option that says "Replace ShowPost links with Permalinks". Has that option been removed in the latest vbseo version already? If so, do I still need to do anything to set it to replace?= showpost links with permalinks?

[Brian Cummiskey]

the 'sitemap' links you are seeing are actually from the archive.

Make sure at the very least they are set up to 'rewrite & redirect', or disable them entirely.
[How To] Completely Turn Off the vBulletin Archive - vBulletin SEO Forums


Keep in mind that it will take a good 4-8 weeks for Google to go through your site and index. You've only had it installed for less than a week, and you're already getting picked up, which is a good sign.