Moved forums to root now rewriting doesn't work 100%

[Sim]

I moved my forums from /forums to the root, and renamed the forum home page to forums.php (I have an existing home page at index.php)

Now I'm getting wierd results from page rewriting.

The most obvious evidence is that the VBSEO_COPYRIGHT comment isn't getting rewritten ... so there's no vBSEO copyright statement appearing on many of my pages (there are some that do, but most don't).

Also, links aren't being rewritten for when the page displays (eg I'm seeing showthread.php and forumdisplay.php when I hover over links, rather than seeing the SEO'd version. The links work correctly when I click on them (mostly).

Some threads no longer work too ... I have a poll thread that won't display, even using the showthread URL.

I'm guessing it is a htaccess or custom rewrite rule problem.

Anyone pointers for obvious things I may have forgotten to configure ? Or should I just log a ticket and get someone to look over my htaccess and vBSEO config ?

[Sim]

Okay ... the non-rewriting problem seems to have resolved itself ... cache problem perhaps ?

I'm still getting the problem displaying this one thread (which happens to have a poll in it ... not sure if that is relevant - other threads with polls still work).

Firefox simply shows a page showing "Page not found"

If I turn vbSEO off, the showthread.php works. Turn it back on, it redirects to the SEO'd URL and gives the error.

Suggestions ?

[Oleg Ignatiuk]

Hello Simon,

I'm still getting the problem displaying this one thread (which happens to have a poll in it ... not sure if that is relevant - other threads with polls still work).

Firefox simply shows a page showing "Page not found"

Could you please post a link to that thread?

[Sim]

http://www.invested.com.au/26/how-do...d-forums-4875/

The non-SEO version of the thread would be: http://www.invested.com.au/showthread.php?t=4875

[Oleg Ignatiuk]

You have customized URL formats and there seems to be a conflict with one of them.
Do you have any Custom Rewrite Rules defined or URL format that includes "forums" word?

[Sim]

Ahh good call ...

I'm rewriting my forums.php to forums

'forums\.php' => 'forums'

I guess that's causing the problem ?

Is there a better way of doing this that won't cause an issue ?

[Sim]

mmm - yes that's definitely the cause of the problem.

eeek - I guess this means my other custom rules are breaking things ...

'showpage\.php\?p=(about)$' => '$1'
'showpage\.php\?p=(privacy)$' => '$1'
'showpage\.php\?p=(terms)$' => '$1'
'showpage\.php\?p=(agreement)$' => '$1'
'showpage\.php\?p=(login)$' => '$1'
'showpage\.php\?p=(rss)$' => '$1'
'chat\.php' => 'chat'

... indeed, I just tested a thread with chat in the SEO'd URL ... and it has the same problem. *sigh*

I suppose these rules could really live in the htaccess instead

[Sim]

Okay, I've moved those problem rules to htaccess - does the job.

So is it possible to have /forums.php be rewritten/redirected as /forums so I don't have two URLs being indexed ?

Note that I'm also redirecting /forums/(.*) to /$1 after moving the forums to root.

[Oleg Ignatiuk]

I'm rewriting my forums.php to forums

'forums\.php' => 'forums'

I guess that's causing the problem ?

Yes, the CRR is conflicting in this case. You can change to:
'forums\.php$' => 'forums'

to avoid this (similar with other CRRs).

[Sim]

Oh, you mean like in the example in the control panel ?

*slaps himself in the head* doh!

Thanks

[Oleg Ignatiuk]

You are welcome