Mini Mods - HTTP Error Response Codes by BOP5 (Soft 404 Solution)

Brought to you by BirdOPrey5 / Qapla.com

This issue was brought to my attention by Sherrie at TAZ in this thread.

The issue is that when Google crawls a site and runs into the vBulletin No Permission message or other standard vBulletin error pages vBulletin gives the standard "200" HTTP response code which means everything is OK, even though there is no real content on these pages. Therefore Google considers these "soft errors" and they can damage overall SEO of your site if there are too many of them.

What this does is make vBulletin return standard HTTP "Error" responses- by default 403 (Not Authorized) for No Permission pages and 404 (Not Found) for general error messages. When Google sees these responses (as opposed to 200) it knows not to bother indexing the page and everyone is happy.

As of version 2.2 new options have been added to return custom response codes when the forum is closed or when the forum is busy. It will also send a retry header telling the crawler they can try again later. As of version 2.0 there is also a separate response code for search.php errors.

A limitation of this mod is it works best with PHP 5.4.0 or higher. As of version 2.0 If you are on an older version of PHP it may not work, but it should not cause any errors, so it is worth trying.

There are no instructions, once installed it is enabled by default. In Admin CP -> Settings -> Options -> HTTP Error Responses by BOP5 you can enable/disable the mod and choose the response codes you want for the different error types. You can use any standard HTTP response code available from this list at wikipedia.

The mod works fine on VB 3.x or 4.x including VB 3.8.8 (still in Beta) and VB 4.2.2.

To test that it is working use a free online status checker such as: http://httpstatus.io/
(Note the site will cache your result for a while so test with a unique URL each time.)

Before you install the mod any URL that will show a no-permission or other vBulletin error will show a status code of 200. After installing the same page will show a 403, 404, or other code that you have configured.

Added Boothby as a "co-author" as thanks for his contribution of code and ideas. :up:

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Please "Mark as Installed" if you use this.
Donations always appreciated. :up:
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[Alibass]

Originally Posted by BirdOPrey5

I see you have vB Optimise and DBSEO... My guess is a conflict with one of these.

It is my understand DBSEO has added this feature (or will soon) - double check it's not trying to do the same thing already.

However now you have issues with the photography site a browser issue is possible too.

Originally Posted by joeychgo

haven't changed anything

where did you see that

I got this link http://www.forcbodiesonly.com/mopar-forum/forum.php from another thread you posted in and when I went there yesterday I got that error, but today all is working with that link. Perhaps you or someone else was working on your site at the time of my visit.

[Alibass]

Originally Posted by BirdOPrey5

I see you have vB Optimise and DBSEO... My guess is a conflict with one of these.

It is my understand DBSEO has added this feature (or will soon) - double check it's not trying to do the same thing already.

However now you have issues with the photography site a browser issue is possible too.

BOP5

DBSEO has this feature and I am using it and your mod along with DBOptomise. I am not having any conflicts.

[BirdOPrey5]

Originally Posted by joeychgo

I don't have either..... vB Optimise or DBSEO

Browser issue is possible, but I only have trouble with sites that have this mod installed. It also is happening on 2 separate computers, so its likely not a browser issue past a common setting.

My mistake, I thought Alibass's signature link was yours.

[Boothby]

When the error happens again, can you open the Developer Tools Network Tab and make a screenshot of it?

[joeychgo]

Originally Posted by Boothby

When the error happens again, can you open the Developer Tools Network Tab and make a screenshot of it?

Sure

[AusPhotography]

Originally Posted by joeychgo

No its not...
I get this when I click LOG IN on your site

Hmm strange. I can't replicate that. I get a normal rejection screen.

Also: A link to content hidden from guests... http://www.ausphotography.net.au/for...-in-Launceston

Originally Posted by joeychgo

I don't have either..... vB Optimise or DBSEO

We don't either. We do run DBOptomise.
We also have xCache.

[DemOnstar]

Not sure about this Joe.
I noticed a 60% drop in visitors since install.

A user informed me that they were unable to access the site and so I went along to see for myself.
They are getting error 500.

I normally have no problem accessing the site from where I stay but, I went along to the users place and I couldn't access and got the same 500 error. (misconfiguration on the server).

I disabled the mod and the error went away.

Tested in IE, Firefox, Chrome.

EDIT: the error went away for me but she still had the same error.
She is using a Samsung Galaxy device with Chrome as her browser.

She has not ever been able to access the site.

Weird one as I was in the same bar, I got the error, disabled the mod from another bar and gained access but she still cannot.

[BirdOPrey5]

Originally Posted by DemOnstar

Not sure about this Joe.
I noticed a 60% drop in visitors since install.

A user informed me that they were unable to access the site and so I went along to see for myself.
They are getting error 500.

I normally have no problem accessing the site from where I stay but, I went along to the users place and I couldn't access and got the same 500 error. (misconfiguration on the server).

I disabled the mod and the error went away.

Tested in IE, Firefox, Chrome.

EDIT: the error went away for me but she still had the same error.
She is using a Samsung Galaxy device with Chrome as her browser.

She has not ever been able to access the site.

Weird one as I was in the same bar, I got the error, disabled the mod from another bar and gained access but she still cannot.

A 500 is a server error... usually not from PHP. The good thing is that a 500 error should be logged- You should be able to get more info from the error log.

What is your PHP version?

[Boothby]

Originally Posted by joeychgo

Sure

You should then reload the page to see the network traffic and the headers sent.

[DemOnstar]

Apache version 2.2.27
PHP version 5.2.17
MySQL version 5.5.37-log

Not sure what is happening really. All a bit random. I get access from one place but not from another.