Domain Pointer non-alias / alias & SEO / search engines / Google

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intelliot

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How are DirectAdmin domain pointers seen by search engines? Does DirectAdmin issue a proper 301 redirect for non-alias pointers? I assume the alias ones would make the domain look the same -- so if Google gets to both, could it be considered a duplicate content problem?

Thanks
 
I don't know the answer to the first part of your post and I don't have time to check it right now. I do know that the second part of your post is correct; that DA simply creates a ServerAlias in the httpd.conf file when set to use an alias.

Can you test for the first part of your question yourself, and post back with the response?

Jeff
 
Code: 
#1 Server Response: [url]http://www.googleboard.com[/url]
HTTP Status Code: HTTP/1.1 302 Found
Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2005 06:47:04 GMT
Server: Apache/1.3.33 (Unix) mod_jk/1.2.13-dev mod_ssl/2.8.22 OpenSSL/0.9.7a PHP/4.3.11 mod_perl/1.29 FrontPage/5.0.2.2510
Location: [url]http://www.googlecommunity.com/[/url]
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1
Redirect Target: [url]http://www.googlecommunity.com/[/url]

#2 Server Response: [url]http://www.googlecommunity.com/[/url]
HTTP Status Code: HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2005 06:47:04 GMT
Server: Apache/1.3.33 (Unix) mod_jk/1.2.13-dev mod_ssl/2.8.22 OpenSSL/0.9.7a PHP/4.3.11 mod_perl/1.29 FrontPage/5.0.2.2510
X-Powered-By: PHP/4.3.11
Set-Cookie: phpbb2mysql_data=a%3A0%3A%7B%7D; expires=Sun, 20 Aug 2006 06:47:04 GMT; path=/; domain=.googlecommunity.com
Set-Cookie: phpbb2mysql_sid=cfe04a733057f029ba3f9b25661dba8a; path=/; domain=.googlecommunity.com
Cache-Control: private, pre-check=0, post-check=0, max-age=0
Expires: 0
Pragma: no-cache
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html
Domain pointer googleboard to googlecommunity (not alias)

I don't see 301 anywhere. I think it would be preferred for an actual 301 redirect to be supported.
 
It depends on the HTTP headers. In PHP, I use:
PHP: 
header ('HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently');
 
Completely off topic, but I'd be very careful of trademark/copyright infringements with those names - Google tends to protect their trademark as vigorously as Ebay (pirannahs)

Just my 2c
 
Google likes sites like googlefight.com and googleguide.com, both of which are not affiliated with Google. There are lots of other domains in use with Google in their name, and Google has had no problem with them.
 
DirectAdmin domain pointers and GOOGLE

How are DirectAdmin domain pointers seen by search engines? Does DirectAdmin issue a proper 301 redirect for non-alias pointers? I assume the alias ones would make the domain look the same -- so if Google gets to both, could it be considered a duplicate content problem?
Click to expand...

DirectAdmin domain pointers can be hidden from any Search Engine.
DirectAdmin does not issue a proper 301 redirect for non-alias pointers.
 
seouk512 said:
DirectAdmin domain pointers can be hidden from any Search Engine.
Click to expand...
Sorry to resurrect an old post here but I was curious about this one.

I use quite a lot of pointers as it's a good way of catching emails sent to the wrong domain without the headache of creating forwarders. I only found this out by accident but though it was a nice benefit of using pointers.

Anyway, I too am a little worried about duplicate content so was wondering if you could elaborate a little on how you would go about "hiding" the pointers from search engines?
 
Thanks for that Peter, boy do I feel a bit stupid, the answer was staring me in the face!

Just in case anyone else reads this later, the users httpd.conf on DirectAdmin can be found at /usr/local/directadmin/data/users/USERNAME/httpd.conf

Also just to clarify, Peter's link will take you to a tutorial for doing a 301 redirect by using .htaccess - by using DirectAdmin pointers, you will have nowhere to put an .htaccess file so this tutorial is probably better for anyone looking to do this.
 
To do it properly, just copy

/usr/local/directadmin/data/templates/redirect_virtual_host.conf

to

/usr/local/directadmin/data/templates/custom/redirect_virtual_host.conf

then edit that file with

Code: 
Redirect [b]301[/b] / http://www.|DOMAIN|/

then

Code: 
echo "action=rewrite&value=httpd" >> /usr/local/directadmin/data/task.queue
 
Last edited:
Hello,

Thanks for the info.
I've added the 301 to the default redirect_virtual_host.conf for the next release of DA.

John
 
jonium said:
I noticed that in the last release of DA there is this, is it implemented for the already created 301 redirect too?
Click to expand...
If you mean has 1.37 the 301 fix then yes. Before 1.37, it was a 302 (temporary), so if its a 302, search engines will keep hitting your domain pointers. Not sure what affect it has on SEO but Google states a 301 redirect is better.
 
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