Joomla SEF Components
I was looking at one of my clients Mambo based website, to see what it would take to move it to Joomla.
Main reason for this was that the Administrator Interface of version 4.5.x breaks the menu in Internet Explorer 7.
One of the Components I used on this site was Remosef, a special, but very stable SEF Component.
So I thought I would check if there was an update for version 4.6 if that transition would be easier than the conversion to Joomla..
But there was a nice surprise from Martin Brampton…
The Remosef for Joomla Component
As it turns out, Martin has created a SEF Component upgrade for Joomla 1.0.x version.
And since I liked the stability and simplicity of the old Remosef for Mambo component I put it into a test for you.
Now this is not a special technical test, like seeing how much queries and processing time this component takes, you have task other people how it preforms in that area.
For me the simplicity and workability counts, it should be as easy as possible for you.
Normally the installation of the component is just enough, with some alterations in the standard Joomla .htaccess to make sure you can use Third party SEF Components.
For the optimum results of this component, there is an extra step to take, but that is not that hard to do.
Installing the Component
Like I said, step one is always downloading the component and reading the information and installation instructions.
You follow Download the Remosef Component to get the file…
But make sure you also Download the SEF Modules, you will need them later on.
“Caution…. don’t install this component, or any other component on a website that is already in the search engine indexes!”
Remosef is the Only site that has a warning like this, and some thoughts on duplicate content as well…. good thinking..
But of you have I website with the standard Joomla SEF URLs, you might reconsider :-)
Installation of the component is just like any other component, just by using the Component Installer of Joomla, point it to the .zip file and “Upload and Install” basically you are done after you made the changes to the .access file and upload it to the root.
You have to set the options in the .htaccess file to get the Third party SEF components to run, but you have to add an extra line at the end of the file, just as explained on the remosef site:
RewriteRule ^(content/|component/|jos/) index.php
Last step is to unzip the module file, and upload the files via FTP, directories are already made, so you can FTP it in one session.
These modules make sure that you get the best result from the rewrites done by the component.
Configuration of the SEF Component
Now here is why I like the component…
If you check the administration panel of the component, there is just one page.
The page consist of a few sections:
- Remosef Options
- Component name mappings
- Character translations
- Content tasks translations
That’s it..
Look at the Remosef options:
Normally after installation the SEF prefix says “jos” but you might not want that in your URL, do you?
So you can change it to something like “site”, but if you do this, you also have to match that in you .htaccess file!
For this option it would become:
RewriteRule ^(content/|component/|sites/) index.php
The second option you should always set to “yes” since hyphens do better in SEO than underscores.
The Component name mappings:
As you can see, you can set any name for the normal and extra components to be rewritten to whatever you like…
And yes, I have to correct the Typo in Technical Articles…
The Character translations options are specifically for Foreign languages to rewrite things like ö and ü to “oe” en “ue”
Content task translations
You can rewrite every content name with anything you like:
You could do only one here, if you don’t like the “view” in you URL, you could use “pages”instead.
With all the settings you could set in the manner as described, you would get URLs like:
http://www.example.com/site/pages/General/General/Information-on-Opensource-and-Internet-Resources/
Notice the Upper and Lower text? Remosef takes the exact phrase of you title!
If you use the standard after installation you would have seen example.com/jos/view/ instead of example.com/site/pages/
If you know Logout, you get an error… because of the rewrite.. You also get an error if you want to use the “preview”option form you administrator panel.
Don’t worry, its just those two, and its because the index.php isn’t used anymore because of the rewrite function.
Why I like it?
Because it works that simple.. and because it the most stable SEF component I know, next to SEF Advanced.
And it works with all SEF_extend.php that are compatible with SEF Advanced.
I am currently in the process of setting up an new website with this component, once its loaded with content and gets indexed by Google, I will post the results and look if it works like I think it will.
And although it says its in “Beta” I have found no errors yet.
And here is another nice part.. it has its own Joomla 404 errorpage… and you can modify it as well.
Test revealed you get a standard Error 404 from IE7, but the modified page from Firefox, but with the right 404 Not Found headers.. whohaa!!!
So if you are looking for a SEF Component for your Joomla based website, don’t forget to check Remosef for Joomla
Hello Pathos,
Very good article and good to hear a bit about other solutions for sef. I develop sh404SEF, and I would like to second you in your comment about thinking twice to change URL if you already have content in search engine. However, I’d also like to mention that, being aware of this issue, I have tried to overcome it for the 2 most common situations : 1/ sites with no sef url 2/ sites with joomla standard SEF
In both cases, sh404SEF will recognize the old style URL and perform a 301 redirect to the new style sef url. That should ease the transition from joomla standard URL to new format
@shumisha
Thank you for your comment, and I will try the sh404SEF component on a new site to test it.
Most of the other SEF components will pick up the No-SEF link and the Standard SWEF links as well.
Main problem is still getting the “old” links out of Google because of the lack of 404 error in Joomla.
Its giving a 200 OK header almost all of the time…
Hi Pathos,
Actually, most component will ‘accept’ non-sef in the way that this page will be served. But the user will be served the ‘old’ URL. Only Opensef does a 301 redirect to the new UR. From alledia review, I know that SEF Advance does not do that, and Joomsef I don’t know. As far as I know, sh404SEF is the only one doing also a 301 redirect for Joomla standard SEF to new URL.
The good thing about it is that you don’t have to worry anymore about the 404 issue, because Google will automatically remove your old URL from its index, when it sees a 301 redirect to another page.
Not withstanding, sh404SEF (and Joomsef, and I think OpenSEF ) do provide a real 404 (I mean page header) when a page is missing
@shumisha
thanks for the info, from opensef I know you can ste the page you want to be your 404 page, but the header is still 200 OK
For Joomlsef I thought you need another plugin to get a real 404.
There is also an 301 redirect extension from http://www.joomla-addons.org/ so maybe a combination of those will work as well.
But I will defintly true the sh404SEF extension to see how it handels my old urls…
Would be a nice step formward to getting the Duplicates out of Google.
The Webmaster tools didn’t work because of the 200 headers.
Hi pathos,
I have to correct what I said yesterday, as I have read that SEF Advanced indeed redirects standard Joomla SEF URL to new, full SEF URL
Regards
I have 5 sites coded in .aspx (example: http://www.dubrovnikpalace.hr, http://www.hotel-kompas.hr, etc.), and we consider to use Yoomla, because we need to redesign 7 sites in short time period, so what I want to ask is what I need to do, not to louse a today ranking . What will eventually happen if we upload a new site to old directory (how will Google react, are we loose our ranking instantly).
@Zeljko
Contact a SEO Firm that can help you setup 301 redirects form the Old URls to the new Content pages.
If you replace your old content you could also use a component like sh404SEF or JoomSEF, register the 404 errors and redirect those URLs to the new content pages.
Anyway you look at it, it takes a lot of effort and carefull planning to change a websites Conten Management System.
I wish you lots of succes and hope it works out well for you.
very helpful article
I was just thinking about The Forgotten Joomla SEF Component and you’ve really helped out. Thanks!
Good post, but have you thought about The Forgotten Joomla SEF Component before?
This is very old. But got know about SEF component. Thanks!