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Rwfresh

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Thanks W&W.

 

This is proof that Google WILL index ANY OSC 2.2 MS2 site, without ANY optimization, whatsoever. OSC does NOT have any problems whatsoever getting indexed, period.

 

There are alot of things you can do to improve your rankings, however, they are not required to just get indexed.

 

110% agree with what you have written above. Osc does not have a problem with getting listed onto any Search Engine - it simply is a matter of time and patience.

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Thanks W&W.

 

This is proof that Google WILL index ANY OSC 2.2 MS2 site, without ANY optimization, whatsoever. OSC does NOT have any problems whatsoever getting indexed, period.

 

There are alot of things you can do to improve your rankings, however, they are not required to just get indexed.

 

110% agree with what you have written above. Osc does not have a problem with getting listed onto any Search Engine - it simply is a matter of time and patience.

thanks guys!

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I have read this thread top to bottom 3 times. There are some interesting points made here. What is lacking is SPECIFIC help. "Adding an allprodicts.php so the engines have something to base off of" (Sorry Burt, yours just stuck in my head :P ) It would be REALLY nice for those of us who do not completely understand this Search Engine Optimization thing to have a WIKI thread explaining all the wonderful suggestions that have been outlined in this thread.

 

You all have touched on some great suggestions. Frankly, for this to help me, I need specifics. Here is my situation:

 

I have MS1.

 

1) I have installed Linda's meta tag generator contrib.

2) I need to know how to change the <title> to each of my products so I can be indexed on all my products.

3) I need to know how to install this "allproducts.php" page.

4) I need to know which SID killer is the preferred one to use.

 

I am willing to be the OSC dummy here to get this info posted to this thread. I think it is wonderful of all of you to make these suggestions. I am taking copius notes. I just need a little clarification. I was visited by Inktomi and Google in the past 3 days. I got 1 page view from both. I need to do some work, but I also need a specific plan. If someone would either take the time to post these answers here, or PM me with the information, I would be MOST appreciative.

 

Thanks again for a great thread, and I hope more information surfaces on SE submission. This seems to be the "trick" to getting rich with web commerce. :)

 

 

BTW, here is a sample of the Google search Engine Optimization Tool spidering my site. as you can see, it is NOT pretty. :(

 

Spidered Text :

CircuitrySolutions.com 922 Hwy 81 East #105 McDonough, Ga. 30252 Shopping Cart Totals [ 0 Items $0.00 0 lbs ] Home ? Products  Products CamcordersCamerasComputer Hardware->Computer SoftwareHome Electronics->Personal Electronics->  Information  What's New? Magellan 701220 GPS Companion Carrying Case$12.99  Quick Find Use keywords to find the product you are looking for.  Advanced Search New Customers - Please click on the sign in button in the Log In Here box at the right. Next, click the continue button and fill out the provided form to create your account. Returning Customers - Enter email address and password into the Log In Here box at the right, then click the sign in button. To Begin Shopping - Choose a category from the products box in the upper left corner. Enjoy your shopping adventure and thank you for visiting CircuitrySolutions! Panasonic DMCF7 Digital Still Cam$389.99 ATI 100437002 AGP 128MB DDR Radeon 9600 PRO Graphics Processing$198.99 Canon Powershot S50 Digital Camera$595.99 Sony CRX220A1 Internal ATAPI EIDE w/ Buffer Underrun Protection$75.99 Phlips 32FD9954 Plasma TV$3,375.99 Canon PowerShot G3 Digital Camera$625.34  Log In Here E-Mail address: Password:

Spidered Links :

https://secure.circuitrysolutions.com/account.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/shopping_cart.php

https://secure.circuitrysolutions.com/checkout_shipping.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php?cPath=118

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php?cPath=1

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php?cPath=99

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php?cPath=114

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php?cPath=2

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/index.php?cPath=83

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/about.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/conditions.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/contact_us.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/privacy.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/shipping.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/tracking.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=590

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=590

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/advanced_search.php

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=462

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=462

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=849

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=849

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=467

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=467

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=468

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=468

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=864

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=864

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=660

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=660

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=590

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=866

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=411

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=478

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=588

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=589

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=571

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=404

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=660

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com/product_...products_id=522

http://www.arnoldesign.com

http://www.circuitrysolutions.com

http://www.oscommerce.com

 

 

Thanks in advance for any help that will be offered.

 

Mark

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I do not class <title> as a meta tag in the strict sense of the word.

 

I cannot post you an example as I would then be accused by the Moderators of posting a commercial URL.  So I will PM you - if you could then post back here to confirm that you have indeed seen a URL with lots of pages with the same <title> that would be great.

Just wanted to post back confirmation, as per Burt's request, that he has proven that you can in fact have google index more than one page, with identical Titles, which I had not thought possible.

 

This is proof that Google WILL index ANY OSC 2.2 MS2 site, without ANY optimization, whatsoever. OSC does NOT have any problems whatsoever getting indexed, period.

 

There are alot of things you can do to improve your rankings, however, they are not required to just get indexed.

Tell me why then, there is a search engine friendly configuration option in osCommerce?

 

I challenge you to go to Google and find me a link to a page that has parameters in the URL ... there aren't any.

 

Either Google ignores every page that has URL parameters, or it indexes the page and strips off the parameters. The latter would make no sense whatsoever, since the page that the Google user links to often won't be the same page as was indexed.

 

I don't mean to offend you wow, but you post with an air of knowledge and superiority when the content of your posts is really questionable.

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Hmm no edit on this forum ... my apologies wow, that still came across as offensive.

 

What I mean is this - could we have less dogmatic allegiance and more empirical investigation in this discussion?

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Tell me why then, there is a search engine friendly configuration option in osCommerce?

 

Don't know. Utter waste of time it being in there. Do you reall ythink that Oscommerce has 100% perfect code and that everything that is there works as intended?

 

I challenge you to go to Google and find me a link to a page that has parameters in the URL ... there aren't any.

 

There are thousands of pages listed in google with parameters! Try this:

 

http://www.google.com/search?as_q=product_...earch=&safe=off

 

That URL might wrap, so beware.

 

Either Google ignores every page that has URL parameters, or it indexes the page and strips off the parameters. The latter would make no sense whatsoever, since the page that the Google user links to often won't be the same page as was indexed.
As above, you have been proved incorrect in your assumption.

 

I don't mean to offend you wow, but you post with an air of knowledge and superiority when the content of your posts is really questionable.

 

There are only a few people here who make it their business to know Search Engines. W&W is one of them, and it's a good job that their are knowledgable people about who have gone one step further than just using Oscommerce for a Store.

 

hth

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1) I have installed Linda's meta tag generator contrib.

 

Waste of time. No Search Engines of any importance use the meta tags that are produced by this contribution.

 

2) I need to know how to change the <title> to each of my products so I can be indexed on all my products.
Search for "title" under my username and you should find a quick code solution to enable this.

 

3) I need  to know how to install this "allproducts.php" page.
Look in contributions area. Follow the instructions - it's about 5 mins work and does the job very well.

 

4) I need to know which SID killer is the preferred one to use.

 

Opinions vary. Whichever one works for you is best - I prefer my own solution which can be found in the "tips and tricks" forum somewhere. Do a search on my username.

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Hi Digger,

 

I guess I'll cut you a little slack becuase this thread has been split, but I did post, earlier in this thread, the reason why there is SEF links in OSC to begin with. It has to do with how Search Engines USED to behave. This is NO LONGER a concern, and honestly, hasn't been for quite some time.

 

And I posted a link to a search in google that shows 1600+ links in google with URL parameters. Here's just a few examples.

 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-...ardsandwars.com

 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=...G=Google+Search

 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=...wind+prophecies

 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=...buy+tron+2.0+pc

 

I don't mean to offend you, Digger, but I post things which I know from experience. But when you post things like

 

find me a link to a page that has parameters in the URL ... there aren't any.

 

It makes you sound like you don't know what you're talking about, which in this case, would be true.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: As of Oct 2006, I'm not as active in this forum as I used to be, but I still work with osC quite a bit.

If you have a question about any of my posts here, your best bet is to contact me though either Email or PM in my profile, and I'll be happy to help.

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Don't know. Utter waste of time it being in there. Do you really think that Oscommerce has 100% perfect code and that everything that is there works as intended?

 

Absolutely not and I never suggested it, which is why I am spending so much time customising and improving the code, looking into these types of questions, and taking part in discussions like this.

 

There are thousands of pages listed in google with parameters!

 

Oh yes! I stand corrected, with respect. I'm glad you proved me wrong.

 

The biggest issue with osCommerce and spidering then, must be all those damn nested tables giving poor ranking results.

 

Over to development forum to discuss upcoming templating development ...

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I guess I'll cut you a little slack becuase this thread has been split, but I did post, earlier in this thread, the reason why there is SEF links in OSC to begin with. It has to do with how Search Engines USED to behave. This is NO LONGER a concern, and honestly, hasn't been for quite some time.

 

I used to be involved in SE research circa 1997 and haven't had anything to do with it since, so that makes sense.

 

Tell me, are there any remaining major search engines that either drop off or penalize pages with URL params?

 

It makes you sound like you don't know what you're talking about, which in this case, would be true.

 

Touche! None taken.

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I also notice there is a robots.txt file that comes with the MS2 2.2 distribution. This file resides in the includes directory and from what i can tell is not referenced by ANY php file in the distribution thereby making it completely useless.

robots.txt files are not meant to be referenced by any PHP files, they are picked up automatically by robots.

 

Not to mention that it is not a properly formatted robots.txt file.

 

I could see a spiders.txt file, but not a robots.txt file. I don't know what a spiders.txt file is, but i shouldn't assume that it must have the same format as a robots.txt file.

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Thanks for the help Burt! I wil get on these changes right away! I will let you know how well an AMATEUR at search engine optimization does with a little help from his friends. ;)

 

 

 

Thanks again!!

 

Mark

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Tell me, are there any remaining major search engines that either drop off or penalize pages with URL params?

 

Very good question!

 

Honestly, I don't know the answer. I've only researched perl, asp and php. There may be other languages that they do still have trouble with.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: As of Oct 2006, I'm not as active in this forum as I used to be, but I still work with osC quite a bit.

If you have a question about any of my posts here, your best bet is to contact me though either Email or PM in my profile, and I'll be happy to help.

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Tell me, are there any remaining major search engines that either drop off or penalize pages with URL params?

 

Very good question!

 

Honestly, I don't know the answer. I've only researched perl, asp and php. There may be other languages that they do still have trouble with.

Um, I dont see what perl, asp and php have to do with it ...

 

HTTP as a protocol is abstracted from language - whether a site is perl, asp, php, python, jsp, ada, smalltalk or cobol should make no difference, except where the web server itself is implemented in that language, and even then it's still nothing inherently to do with the language.

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Well, you're right, it probably means nothing.

 

Until very recently, in the Google's faq about dynamic indexing, they listed a bunch of different types of extensions that they were ok with indexing the dynamic pages of. However, today, when I went back to refamiliarize myself with them, they have changed the page completly.

 

As for the major search engines, I've found a few that do, and a few that don't. The one's that don't are less and less each day.

 

The one's that I've found that appear that they do not index dynamic pages...

Altavista

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: As of Oct 2006, I'm not as active in this forum as I used to be, but I still work with osC quite a bit.

If you have a question about any of my posts here, your best bet is to contact me though either Email or PM in my profile, and I'll be happy to help.

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Ah, I get what you're on about now - the appearance of '.php' or '.asp' in a URL that the robot is indexing.

 

Personally, I don't agree with the principle of having filename extensions in a URL. IMHO they should always be abstracted from the filesystem, even if only apparently. That way, there would be no way of telling if a page was generated dynamically anyway, and language would become even less of an issue.

 

Now, that might be a worthwhile SEF contribution even if the existing one isn't. Perhaps I will take a stab when I have some spare time.

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The biggest issue with osCommerce and spidering then, must be all those damn nested tables giving poor ranking results.

Not really. There are some things you can do to an Oscommerce site to get better/more ranking but nested tables does not cause much of a headache.

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I also notice there is a robots.txt file that comes with the MS2 2.2 distribution. This file resides in the includes directory and from what i can tell is not referenced by ANY php file in the distribution thereby making it completely useless.

robots.txt files are not meant to be referenced by any PHP files, they are picked up automatically by robots.

 

Not to mention that it is not a properly formatted robots.txt file.

 

I could see a spiders.txt file, but not a robots.txt file. I don't know what a spiders.txt file is, but i shouldn't assume that it must have the same format as a robots.txt file.

 

 

they are for robots.. but shouldn't it be in the webroot? or catalog root? the one i am talking about is in the INCLUDES directory.. So which spider is going to find it? I don't know about you but i don't have any links to my includes directory. Besides robots.txt should be in root.. the only place a spider looks.

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The spiders.txt file is a file included in OSC2.2 MS2 that is used by the 'spider killer' process.

 

Your spiders.txt is not supposed to be ready by the spiders. I believe it's supposed to include the User Agents of all of the spiders you wish to ensure do not have a SID appended to the URLs.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: As of Oct 2006, I'm not as active in this forum as I used to be, but I still work with osC quite a bit.

If you have a question about any of my posts here, your best bet is to contact me though either Email or PM in my profile, and I'll be happy to help.

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Hello Everyone who cares.

 

What is the purpose of worrying about ranking if your site cannot be spidered? I have spent the last few days checking and re-checking my site. I can honestly say that ANYONE who is simply assuming OSC to be spiderable, consequently indexable, SE friendly out of the box is doing themselves a disservice.

 

If you are one of the FEW to have your site successfully indexed then you are smart to have spent the time making it work. Unforetunately for those that have not had success there is no "fix" available. There are suggestions and possible fixes. nothing more. Do not assume anything. This is my experience.

 

There is DEFINETLY no concrete one patch fixes all way to make your store spiderable by all SE's. It does not exist.

 

Forget about ranking.. seriously. People arguing about ranking when their sites cannot even be spidered.. it makes no sense.

 

rw

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The spiders.txt file is a file included in OSC2.2 MS2 that is used by the 'spider killer' process.

 

Your spiders.txt is not supposed to be ready by the spiders. I believe it's supposed to include the User Agents of all of the spiders you wish to ensure do not have a SID appended to the URLs.

Back to my original point.

 

 

It is not , atleast in my version of MS2 2.2 not referenced by ANY file whatsoever. By html_output or anything else. So in other words.. it's a ghost file. sitting in a directory serving no purpose at all.

 

rw

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The spiders.txt file is a file included in OSC2.2 MS2 that is used by the 'spider killer' process.

 

Your spiders.txt is not supposed to be ready by the spiders. I believe it's supposed to include the User Agents of all of the spiders you wish to ensure do not have a SID appended to the URLs.

Back to my original point.

 

 

It is not , atleast in my version of MS2 2.2 not referenced by ANY file whatsoever. By html_output or anything else. So in other words.. it's a ghost file. sitting in a directory serving no purpose at all.

 

rw

Sorry i just double checked.. it is in fact referenced in the application_top.php file..

 

This is a little re-assuring..

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Hello Everyone who cares.

 

What is the purpose of worrying about ranking if your site cannot be spidered? I have spent the last few days checking and re-checking my site. I can honestly say that ANYONE who is simply assuming OSC to be spiderable, consequently indexable, SE friendly out of the box is doing themselves a disservice.

 

If you are one of the FEW to have your site successfully indexed then you are smart to have spent the time making it work. Unforetunately for those that have not had success there is no "fix" available. There are suggestions and possible fixes. nothing more. Do not assume anything. This is my experience.

 

There is DEFINETLY no concrete one patch fixes all way to make your store spiderable by all SE's. It does not exist.

 

Forget about ranking.. seriously. People arguing about ranking when their sites cannot even be spidered.. it makes no sense.

 

rw

Absolute rubbish. I can show you a site that is in Google that;

 

- has no pagerank

- has no backlinks

- is not a real store (still has the default products)

- has never been submitted to google

- has never been promoted anywhere

- has no extra code to enable easy "spidering"

 

So how, according to your research has that site made it into Google?

 

Google will add your site without any problem whatsoever - just go and submit the main page.

 

To get better rankings, then yes there are many changes you can do to enable this. You need to search the Forums and apply the knowledge you find.

 

To anyone reading, rwfresh is muddying the waters with his comments which serve no valulable purpose. His comment "If you are one of the FEW to have your site successfully indexed", makes zero sense, as there are thousands of Oscommerce sites successfully listed in Google. It takes one quick search to find this out.

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Hello Everyone who cares.

 

What is the purpose of worrying about ranking if your site cannot be spidered? I have spent the last few days checking and re-checking my site. I can honestly say that ANYONE who is simply assuming OSC to be spiderable, consequently indexable, SE friendly out of the box is doing themselves a disservice.

 

If you are one of the FEW to have your site successfully indexed then you are smart to have spent the time making it work. Unforetunately for those that have not had success there is no "fix" available. There are suggestions and possible fixes. nothing more. Do not assume anything. This is my experience.

 

There is DEFINETLY no concrete one patch fixes all way to make your store spiderable by all SE's. It does not exist.

 

Forget about ranking.. seriously. People arguing about ranking when their sites cannot even be spidered.. it makes no sense.

 

rw

What in the world are you talking about??

 

Your OWN sitre has been indexed already.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: As of Oct 2006, I'm not as active in this forum as I used to be, but I still work with osC quite a bit.

If you have a question about any of my posts here, your best bet is to contact me though either Email or PM in my profile, and I'll be happy to help.

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For those of you that this guy is scaring to death, lets take a look at evidence.

 

This guy has been aruging for over a week now that Google does not index (meaning include in their index at all) OSC sites. He is dead set that he can not get indexed, and that the vast mojority of people who use OSC will not get indexed.

 

This is absolutly false. Don't let this guy scare you, he doesn't know what he's talking about. His OWN site has been indexed by Google.

 

http://www.google.com/search?q=teetimesnev...=UTF-8&filter=0

 

If you have manually submitted to Google, give Google enough time (up to 3 months) then Google WILL index you. That means you are better off worrying about how to improve your rankings, than you are worrying about some imaginary non-existant prejudice Google has against dynamic content websites and OSC.

 

Best of luck to all.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NOTE: As of Oct 2006, I'm not as active in this forum as I used to be, but I still work with osC quite a bit.

If you have a question about any of my posts here, your best bet is to contact me though either Email or PM in my profile, and I'll be happy to help.

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