4 replies to this topic

[bobmeetin]

I'm taking on a new site; a couple months back I set up Google Analytics, got it verified and is happy. When I access google Webmaster Tools it appears a little more disconcerting. Yes the message: http://www.example.com/: Googlebot can't access your site Under Current Status and crawl errors, - DNS - Yellow image with exclamation point - Server Connectivity - Happy and green - Robots.connectivity fetch - Happy and green Health --> Crawl Errors also confirms the DNS issue. The site has been up for 10 years with 5 pages. I see that in the history. When I visit networksolutions whois database, it gets flying colors. Blocked URLs - looks fine and it is showing the current robots.txt file. Fetch as Google - This passed successfully. If I click Settings and check the www.example.com option as preferred domain it responds with "Please verify http://www.example.com, but no obvious link to verify. I am not sure that this is related, just an observation. Suggestions please?

[chrishirst]

Suggestions please?

Without the actual hostname to check ... None at all.

Could be dozens of "issues"

[bobmeetin]

the hostname? try dot.dottedi.biz

[chrishirst]

Name servers are OK.

http://www.intodns.com/dottedi.biz
(SOA Expire is excessive, more later on that)

DNS propogation seems fine to these locations
http://www.whatsmydn.../#A/dottedi.biz
http://www.whatsmydn...www.dottedi.biz

But there does appear to be a DNS resolution problem in some parts of the world.
http://www.downforev...com/dottedi.biz
http://www.downforev...www.dottedi.biz


SOA is Ok
http://www.whatsmydn...SOA/dottedi.biz

MX points to what I guess are your hosting company's mail servers as does the SPF
http://www.whatsmydn...#MX/dottedi.biz

Not a problem there though.

Reverse DNS shows problems
http://www.whatsmydn...PTR/dottedi.biz
Though if you are on shared hosting that's pretty much par for the course.

Only possible problem that Google might have is no google-verification TXT record
http://www.whatsmydn...TXT/dottedi.biz

But if you used a HTML document or a META Element for verification of domain ownership/control at Google, you don't need one.


Propagotion should complete in 96 to 120 hours tops, so depending how long the hostname has been live with the nameservers you might want to pester your hosting support as the SOA expire of 5 weeks (3600000 seconds) is a bit long to say the least. The default is 24 hours (86400 seconds).
They have obviously extended it to reduce DNS requests to their systems at the detriment of their customers.URLs being found.

Edited by chrishirst, 29 October 2012 - 10:00 AM.

[bobmeetin]

Hey Chris, I looked through your replies. On those that looked questionable I tested the results using google.com, as well as dottedi.biz. The results were the same.

So I went back to webmaster tools, deleted it, then re-added to webmaster tools. No difference. "Googlebot can't access your site".

I started digging further through the webmaster tools links, this time found a URL to a page that identified the problem. On the site the membership registration form was enabled but malfunctioning. The forgot password, register for an account and some other link were all broken. That is what google pointed to for broken DNS. Had they said something more meaningful, like broken links, it would have made more sense...

Thx,