Best way forward

Having moved my site to root folder, I have many indexed urls in google that now fail.

I'm unable to use a .htaccess file in "old" forum directory, as suggested elsewhere, to redirect to new content, so..

What is my best option here, Im guessing in file not found settings, to use "redirect to home page". my thinking here is at least it keeps visitors on the site.

What are your thoughts ?

Hi magz,

Just to help understand why are you unable to place a .htaccess file in the old Dir? what was the name of the old folder? has anything else changed other than moving from folder to root?

Ceri

Hi ceri,

In a nutshell, My previous forum was installed in a folder called "arcade" ( not forum). My reasoning at the time, was it was an arcade site, so seemed logical. Oh hindsite is a wonderful thing.

So my site was at root/arcade ( with vbadvanced in root)

I use the ibproarcade mod, which needs to be in its own "arcade" folder
Now that my site on VB4 is in root, the ibproarcade is in root/arcade

Ive tried renaming the ibproarcade folder, but its referenced in too many places within the mod, and just breaks, so has to stay as is.

That basically is my problem. ( hope Ive made sense )

Thanks for your time

You will need to make custom htaccess adjustments to move all your subforums 1 by 1 into root.

Thanks brian, I submitted a ticlet previously, and was told i Had to have an empty "Arcade" folder with an htacces file in it. So on that basis kind of resigned myself to my initial post in the thread.

Are you saying it can be done? If so, i sadly dont have the expertise on custom htaccess adjustments. Could you give me a pointer on how to get started?

thanks

yes, it can be done.

assuming there's not htaccess file in /arcade,
place the following in root htaccess right above the sitemap rule.

Code:

RewriteRule ^/arcade/forum-name/(.*) http://www.example.com/forum-name/$1 [L,R=301]

one for each forum you have

Thank you so much for helping with this...

Ive done as youve said but am now presented with a 500 - internal server error

there is no .htaccess in current /arcade folder, and heres a sample of my edits, placed above the sitemap rule

RewriteRule ^/arcade/talking point/(.*) http://www.chatanplay.com/talking-point/$1 [L,R=301]

The space in your url is incorrect.
talking point
should be
talking-point
most likely.


And of course, this is IF thats the forum rewrite you used in the past. If you used f123/ you need to use that format.

ive just checked an heres an example of what google has indexed from original

Code:

www.chatanplay.com/arcade/talking-point/3790-oh-so-glad.htm

here is that same thread when viewed currently ( in root )

Code:

www.chatanplay.com/talking-point/3790-oh-so-glad.html

As far as i can see, the files are being re-written the same way.

and heres the current .htaccess entry for this one forum.

Code:

RewriteRule ^/arcade/talking-point/(.*) http://www.chatanplay.com/talking-point/$1 [L,R=301]

Some progress i guess, but im now getting page not found

hmm, im seeing page not found, because it appears it not being redirected, eg

Code:

site:www.chatanplay.com/arcade/talking-point

clicking any thread listed there in google, still tries to take you to the same place, it should now be going to :

Code:

site:www.chatanplay.com/talking-point

this is probably something really simple, but for life of me, I cant suss it

Originally Posted by magz

As far as i can see, the files are being re-written the same way.

Aside from the fact that one is .htm and the other is .html, right?

Because you have chosen to change the extension, the generic 'redirect all' .htaccess rule Brian provided won't work.

I'm far from an expert at .htaccess directives, but it would be something like:

Code:

RewriteRule ^/arcade/talking-point/(.*).htm http://www.chatanplay.com/talking-point/$1.html [L,R=301]

I'm almost 100% sure that's not quite right, there's likely to be something needed before the .htm/html bits. :(

*edit* Or, you could change your current URL setup to match what you had before, so the threads are rewritten as .htm rather than .html.

Thanks for looking Ace, sadly, my entry was a typo, both are listed as .html

but well spotted there.

Any other suggestions folks, id really love not to loose my previously indexed files, but if thats what is meant to be, so be it

Awww, dangit. Thought I had figured it out! :(

OK. Let's try again.

Is that .htaccess directive in the Root .htaccess? Does the /arcade/ folder still exist?

Fortunately, I did almost exactly this when I went to vB4, but I went from /forums/ to root. Here's the very top of my .htaccess, in root:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^forums/(.*)$ /$1 [L,R=301]

So, I would expect that using this one might work for you:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^arcade/(.*)$ /$1 [L,R=301]

Put that at the very top of your root's .htaccess file (and remove any subsequent 'RewriteEngine On' lines, because we turned it on at the top'), cross your fingers, burn some incense, and give it a shot.

Oh.. ibproarcade. :(

That might not work in this instance then. Try adapting it to match the subforums as mentioned by Brian/Ceri.

ie:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^arcade/forum-one/(.*)$ /forum-one/$1 [L,R=301]
RewriteRule ^arcade/forum-two/(.*)$ /forum-two/$1 [L,R=301]

You sir, are a genius

That seems to have done the trick

I just quickly tested, and YES, its redirecting me to the root forum / thread

I will keep you posted

Thank you.

UPDATE

Redirects now work, arcade doesnt arggghhh
My users would kill me if no arcade, so untill i can find a fix, have to live with broken indexed urls :(