String Urls Options

[ladybird]

I know that string URLs are a bad idea from an SEO perspective but wondered if anyone could tell me why they are, and why people use them? In other words do certain types of websites have no choice but to use strings?

[linux_lover]

I take it by 'strings' that you mean a Query string?
Some search bots have difficulties spidering pages with a large query string, last time I heard google could handle 5 (might be more now) like:
website.com?var1=1&var2=2&var3=3&var4=4&var5=5

Websites use query strings to pass data between pages and is useful for sites which employ dynamic data from say a database. You can get around query strings using mod_rewrite - a most useful apache extension.

I personally use the page name as the variable... say if you have a page called contact.htm you can use say php to remove the .htm, then look up 'contact' in your db, and match some related content for example.

LiLo

[ladybird]

Thanks so much for that explanation. How big a problem are querry strings for the main SES (Yahoo/MSN) - I know you said Google could handle 5, do Yahoo and MSN have similar capacities?

[linux_lover]

Pass, hopefully some of the nice SEO experts in here can answer that (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Randy]

The general rule I use personally is to keep the URL string to 3 or fewer variables Ladybird.

I can usually pass any data that I need to with that number, and all of the search engines seem to be able to handle that number with relative ease. There is more info on this subject in the Dynamic Sites section of the forums, which is where I'm going to move this to so that it gets better visibility.

[Jill]

I've not seen Yahoo or MSN have any problems with URLs that Google can index. Look at the URLs for this forum. Yahoo and MSN seem to index us jut fine. (At least I think they do, I really don't bother to check it much!)

[ladybird]

Thanks guys, that's really helpful (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/flowers.gif)

[oneofthe3lions]

I also think that the engines are interested in static permanent pages/urls.. dynamic strings pervey that it is potentially a constantly changing page.. hence the useful technique of writing flat files

[Jill]

I also think that the engines are interested in static permanent pages/urls.. dynamic strings pervey that it is potentially a constantly changing page.. hence the useful technique of writing flat files

I disagree with this and have not found it to ever be a problem.

First, dynamic URLs don't signify a constantly changing page. Second, so what if they did? The engines don't mind a constantly changing page. Some people, in fact, seem to think they like those. (I don't personally think they care either way.)

[Coolmac]

With my site, I moved from dynamic urls to "static urls" and found the only section where spidering improved was the forum. And since it was relatively new to the site at the time, that was almost certainly just a coincidence.

In the end though, I'll always code a site now to have static urls, but not because of SEO reasons. The ability hide the exact variable names going into my php scripts, as well as adding extra checking in the .htaccess file increases the security of the page making it a little bit harder for hackers to find problems in your code.

[henri]

I think the best acid test for any URL is "Can you read it to a person over phone?"

Also, if I happen to pop in the middle of a site from a search engine, I usually take a peek at the URL to determine where I'm located (especially if they don't provide a breadcrumb path).

Something for reference:
http://www.google.com/intl/en/webmasters/guidelines.html

Just my two cents.

//Henri

[Raphael]

hear hear - None of our e-commerce site has any query strings, at least, not visible to the user. Some of the iframe src links have query strings, but the users can't see those. Query strings make for ugly URLs, and I hate ugly URLs.