vBSEO Google/Yahoo Sitemap Generator for vBulletin 3.6.x, 3.5.x & 3.0.x

vBSEO Google/Yahoo Sitemap Generator - vBulletin 3.5.x
Download vB 3.8.x Compatible Version Here
Download vB 3.7.x Compatible Version Here
Download vB 3.6.x Compatible Version Here
Download vB 3.0.x Compatible Version Here

Note: Version 2.5 replaces all previous versions of the vBSEO Google/Yahoo Sitemap Generator, and now includes support for all the new URL types in vBulletin 3.8.x.

Overview
============================

Providing Google, Yahoo, Ask sitemaps is an essential step towards improving your forums.

The "vBSEO Google Sitemaps" plugin provides a solution that allows your forum to be indexed by the Google (and also Yahoo and Ask) search engines faster, more completely, more effectively, and with less bandwidth consumption.

The ultimate goal is to help you achieve more web traffic for your forum.

Originally Posted by Google's Description of GSM

https://services.google.com/inquiry/publishertools?hl=en_US
Google Sitemaps is an easy way for you to help improve your site?s representation in the Google index. It's a collaborative crawling system that enables you to communicate directly with Google. You get a smarter crawl because you can provide Google with specific information about all your web pages, such as when a page was last modified or how frequently it changes.

Note: This plugin is fully compliant with vBSEO 3.x version. The current version is vBSEO 3.2. However, if you are running vBSEO, please upgrade to vBSEO 3.2 or greater before installing.

Compatibility
============================

Fully compatible with:

• vBulletin 3.0.x, 3.5.x, 3.6.x, 3.7.x and 3.8.x
• vBulletin Blogs 1.0.x and 2.0.x *Optional
• vBSEO 2.x, 3.x *Optional

What does it do?

============================

• Auto-generates a Google XML sitemap for all of your specified forum URL types (including vBulletin Blog URLs).
• Auto-generates a Yahoo text sitemap for all of your specified forum URL types.
• Auto-notifies Google when a new sitemap is generated.
• Automatically sends you a summary of the sitemap generation via email each time it is created.
• Includes only publicly accessible forums and threads.
• Allows Google/Yahoo to find all of your forum URLs without having to spider the forum to find the links.
• Allows Google/Yahoo to find your forum URLs without having to account for query string and/or session ID information.
• Allows Google to give precedence to crawling your higher priority forum pages.
• Allows Google to give precedence to crawling your forum pages that change more frequently.
• Allows you to conserve bandwidth by more efficiently facilitating the crawling processes for GoogleBot and Yahoo Slurp.
• Is 100% compatible with the static CRUs (Content Relevant URLs) used by vBSEO-enabled forums.

How does it work?
============================

Whenever it is scheduled or invoked via the URL, this plugin will generate both the Google XML formatted and the Yahoo text formatted sitemaps. If you selected "Yes" to the Google auto-notification setting, Google will be notified each time the sitemap is generated. The Yahoo sitemap must be manually submitted to http://submit.search.yahoo.com/free/request/.

• Google Sitemap files are gzipped
• Forum and thread pages are listed with pagination (i.e. all pages for each forums/thread are included in the sitemap)
• Maximum Priority is set for Sticky threads.
• Optimization for sitemap generation on large forums.

Automated Reporting Tool
============================

The vBSEO Sitemap includes a report tool, allowing you to track your progress. To access your reports enter the following URL:

http://www.example.com/forums/vbseo_sitemap/

NOTE: Replace "http://www.example.com/forums/" with the full URL to your vB forum root.


You will be required to login by providing your "Sitemap Interface Access Password" from your vBSEO Sitemap settings in:

• vBulletin Admin CP (for 3.5.x/3.6.x/3.7.x/3.8.x users) OR
• vbseo_sitemap.php configuration file (for 3.0.x users) located in the vbseo_sitemap directory in your forum root.

Once you successfully login, you will be provided with a list of 'Useful Links'. Here are the 4 main links:

Show Reports List
The 'Show Reports List' link will display a report of each time your vBSEO Sitemap generator executed, including the (1) date, (2) run time, (3) total URLs included, and (4) and change in # of URLs included from the last generation.

Each vBSEO Sitemap generation record will include a (1) "View details" and (2) "Remove record" link. The "View Details" link shows more detailed information about the sitemap generated. The "Remove record" will permanently delete the record from your reports.

Show Sitemap Downloads Log
The 'Show Sitemap Downloads Log' link will display a report of each time your vBSEO Sitemap was downloaded by either a search engine (GoogleBot or Yahoo) or by another user agent (i.e. Web browser, etc.).

The report includes the (1) date, (2) name of sitemap file downloaded, (3) Bot, (4) IP address of the downloader, and the (5) User-agent.

Each vBSEO Sitemap download record will include a "Remove record" link which will permanently delete the record from your reports.

Run Sitemap Generator
The 'Run Sitemap Generator' link will automatically regenerate your Google and Yahoo sitemaps.

Your Forums Homepage
The 'Your Forums Homepage' link is a quick link back to your forum homepage.

Additional Links
Additional links to various other related SEO resources are also included.


Click "Install"
============================

Please click "Install" to show your support for this script.


Installation & Configuration for vB 3.5.x, 3.6.x, 3.7.x and 3.8.x as a Plugin
============================

Follow the installation/upgrade instructions provided in the docs/readme.html file.


Google Webmaster Accounts
============================

It is NOT required for you to have a Google Webmaster account to run the vBulletin Google Sitemaps plugin. If you decide to setup an account for testing purposes you can do so here:
http://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/login?sourceid=gsm&subid=us-et-about2


Copyright & Licensing

============================

• vBSEO Google Sitemaps plugin is copyright protected by Crawlability Inc.
• You are free to download and install this plugin on any vBulletin forum for which you hold a valid vB license.
• Unauthorized distribution of any code and/or documentation, whole or in part, included here is strictly prohibited.
• In addition, the following copyright notice must be maintained.

vBSEO(TM) ? 2005-2009 Crawlability, Inc.


Revision History
============================

02/22/2009 - Version 2.5 Released

NEW FEATURE: Blog tags URLs are included.
NEW FEATURE: Social Group Discussion URLs are included.
NEW FEATURE: Smart Priority applied for the following URL types

1. Show Post
2. Member Profiles
3. Forum Display
4. Poll Results
5. Blog Entries
6. Member Profile Albums
7. Social Groups
8. Social Groups Discussions
9. Social Group Pictures
10. Tags
11. Blog Tags

UPDATE: Compatible with vBulletin 3.8.x. Includes the following updated settings:

1. Priority Range - Show Post
2. Priority Range - Member Profiles
3. Priority Range - Forum Display
4. Priority Range - Poll Results
5. Priority Range - Show Thread
6. Priority Range - Blog Entries
7. Priority Range - Member Profile Albums
8. Priority Range - Social Groups
9. Priority Range - Social Group Pictures
10. Priority Range - Tags

Fix: Social Group Discussion database error is fixed.

Upgrade Instructions
============================

(1) Follow the installation/upgrade instructions provided in the docs/readme.html file.

(2) For versions of vBulletin 3.6.x only: Open "Schedule Manager" in the vBulletin Admin Control Panel (admincp); Remove existing scheduled task for Sitemap Generator if you have one.
Note: The new task will be automatically setup when you import the XML product file.

Other vBSEO Plugins

============================

• vBSEO - vBulletin Search Engine Optimization
  
• vBSEO Conditional Signatures for vBulletin

vBSEO Affiliate Program
============================

We welcome you to join the vBSEO Affiliate Program.

[Cloudrunner]

Originally Posted by Snake

I have a question. Do I have to submit my sitemaps daily to Google/Yahoo or it does that automatically?

Yahoo, yes, you must renotify manually.

Google, no, the system notifies Google automatically for you.

[imported_infitech]

is there a newer version for 3.6.4?
forgive me if this question has been answered already, but there is no way to search the forums by JUST typing in 3.6

[quadinfotech]

Originally Posted by imported_infitech

is there a newer version for 3.6.4?
forgive me if this question has been answered already, but there is no way to search the forums by JUST typing in 3.6

Yes it's working fine on 3.6.4,

[quadinfotech]

I installed this product on 3.6.4 with no problems whatsoever,
I have installed vbulletin in /forum folder and I'm also running vbadvanced in the root,

to get this to work properly there's only one change that had to be done in the .htaccess file. You need to add these lines to your .htaccess file in your public_html root not your forum root,

public_html/.htaccess file should have these two lines:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(sitemap.*\.(xml|txt)(\.gz)?)$ forum/vbseo_sitemap/vbseo_getsitemap.php?sitemap=$1 [L]

if you have installed your vbulletin in any other folder just replace that with "forum" in the line above.

If you have installed your vbulletin forum in your public_html root then you don't need any modifications to be made. the included .htaccess file will work just fine.

when you go to google to add your site you need to add the domain and not the domain + forum folder, so yours will look like this:

http://www.yourdomain.com

again do not add the "/forum" to the end of this address.

Now you wanna add your site map enter this line but replace "yourdomain.com" with your own address:

http://www.yourdomain.com/sitemap_1.xml.gz

when google searches for that file in that address your .htaccess file will redirect its request to the appropriate location which is

http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/vbseo_sitemap/sitemap_1.xml.gz

I hope this helps clear out some of the confusion out there and maybe the writers can add this bit to their description on the first post if it's valid.
also would help to mention that this works for 3.6.x as well,
Thank you for sharing this wonderful mod.

[iojam]

caliman,

please check that data/hits/ folder has permissions set to 0777. If it still doesn't work, please open a support ticket at vbseo.com (since this feature works on vBSEO-enabled forums only).

Cloudrunner, quadinfotech

thank you for your contribution!

[Cloudrunner]

Originally Posted by quadinfotech

http://www.yourdomain.com/sitemap_1.xml.gz

when google searches for that file in that address your .htaccess file will redirect its request to the appropriate location which is

http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/vbseo_sitemap/sitemap_1.xml.gz

Just a clarification the filename *should* be sitemap_index.xml.gz

The reason is that if you set your URL amount to split at say 20,000 links (default option) then you will have up to three files, sitemap_1.xml.gz, sitemap_2.xml.gz and sitemap_3.xml.gz if you have more than 20,000 URLs in your sitemap up to a total of the 50,000 URLs allowed by Google.

The sitemap_index.xml.gz tells google where to find the rest of the files after the split has occured. As well, even if you only have one file, it will still point google to the correct file location.

[Cloudrunner]

Originally Posted by iojam

Cloudrunner, quadinfotech

thank you for your contribution!

Not a problem. I had a hell of a time getting this to work 100% and can only hope that it helps out other folks.

CR

[Alfa1]

Does this add on work well with PHP5.2?

[imported_infitech]

Originally Posted by quadinfotech

I installed this product on 3.6.4 with no problems whatsoever,
I have installed vbulletin in /forum folder and I'm also running vbadvanced in the root,

to get this to work properly there's only one change that had to be done in the .htaccess file. You need to add these lines to your .htaccess file in your public_html root not your forum root,

public_html/.htaccess file should have these two lines:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(sitemap.*\.(xml|txt)(\.gz)?)$ forum/vbseo_sitemap/vbseo_getsitemap.php?sitemap=$1 [L]

if you have installed your vbulletin in any other folder just replace that with "forum" in the line above.

If you have installed your vbulletin forum in your public_html root then you don't need any modifications to be made. the included .htaccess file will work just fine.

when you go to google to add your site you need to add the domain and not the domain + forum folder, so yours will look like this:

http://www.yourdomain.com

again do not add the "/forum" to the end of this address.

Now you wanna add your site map enter this line but replace "yourdomain.com" with your own address:

http://www.yourdomain.com/sitemap_1.xml.gz

when google searches for that file in that address your .htaccess file will redirect its request to the appropriate location which is

http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/vbseo_sitemap/sitemap_1.xml.gz

I hope this helps clear out some of the confusion out there and maybe the writers can add this bit to their description on the first post if it's valid.
also would help to mention that this works for 3.6.x as well,
Thank you for sharing this wonderful mod.

Is this true?

[libertate]

Originally Posted by imported_infitech

Is this true?

Yes, but only if you put vbseo_sitemap folder off of your /forum/ directory.
i.e. /forum/vbseo_sitemap/

if you use Cloudrunner's setup then no, it does not need that change.

The remaining part is incorrect as Cloudrunner pointed out. It should point to sitemap_index.xml.gz. You will experience no problems with sitemap_1.xml.gz, as long as you set you do not have multiple files to upload.

On a different note - this unfortunatelly does not work for Y! as when the Y! tries to grap
http://www.yoursite.com/vbseo_sitema...sitemap.txt.gz
It gets redirected to
http://www.yoursite.com/vbseo_sitemap/vbseo_getsitemap.php?sitemap=$1

Of course, if you rename the file sitemap.txt.gz (to say yahoo.txt.gz) and move it to root (or at least out of the vbseo_sitemap folder), than submit that file - Y! will happily accept it.

I think...

Finally, there is a problem with using vBAdvanced pages.

That is, when following Cloudrunner's notes, regular vBA pages are submitted without the root URL

For example:

<url>
  <loc>index.php?pg=bmr_calc</loc>
  <priority>1</priority>
  <lastmod>2006-12-17T19:32:05+00:00</lastmod>
  <changefreq>daily</changefreq>
</url>

As you can see the root is missing. Everywhere else it is proper.