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:
[s]Nominate MOTM if you LOVE it! [/s] (You did, Thanks!)

[BirdOPrey5]

Originally Posted by ramesh_umk3

So if i want to use this i have to spare my VBSEO right ?

I don't know how it would work with VBSEO or not, I don't have VBSEO so I can't and don't test against it.

[djbaxter]

No reason why it shouldn't work with vBSEO.

[EddieDean]

Originally Posted by BirdOPrey5

I don't know how it would work with VBSEO or not, I don't have VBSEO so I can't and don't test against it.

I have VBSEO and its working like a charm.

[ForceHSS]

And no way to make it work with lower php version no way at all

if i edit the min php on the xml
<dependency dependencytype="php" minversion="5.4.0" maxversion="" />
Should it not work

Update got it working for a lower php

[Naijasite]

i just installed the mod it still show a status code of 200. the status did not change to 404

[BirdOPrey5]

I just tried a random bad URL from the site in your signature

http://www.questlot.com/forums/1998

On the website - http://httpstatus.io

And it is showing a 404 response code indicating the mod is working. What URL are you trying that you are getting a 200?

Also- Please "Mark as Installed"

[djbaxter]

Just received this in an email from from Google Webmaster Tools:

http://forum.psychlinks.ca/: Increase in authorization permission errors
Google detected a significant increase in the number of URLs we were blocked from crawling due to authorization permission errors.

I'd say that's pretty good evidence that this add-on is working perfectly.

[puertoblack2003]

nice mod. should i install this along side dbseo?

[BirdOPrey5]

Originally Posted by puertoblack2003

nice mod. should i install this along side dbseo?

Would probably just suggest DBSEO add the feature if they haven't already, but I see no reason it should be a problem.

[ramesh_umk3]

Are your sure brother Bird

DragonByte SEO v1.0.10

Changes to Existing Features:

"No Permission" error screens now send a 403 Access Restricted header
"Go To Post" URLs now redirect to the normal thread URL, improving the canonical URL functionality


Bug Fixes And Issue Fixes:

"Go To Post" URLs now redirect to the normal thread URL
Custom Rewrite Rules would in some circumstances not work as intended
Using the Forum Path system without a forum ID in the path format would create invalid rewritten URLs

Using your mod along with latest dragonbyte wont get any conflicts right ?

Regards,