Simple SEO URL (OLD version) [support thread]

yellow1912:

Hi Chris,

If the link is, like you said, generated by Google, then there is no way we can change the way it works. And also, if it is created by Google, there is no reason why it wouldnt understand the link generated by itself.

Interesting. Perhaps you can pm me the keywork I need to search so that the ads will show up, and then I can investigate the problem? (I promise I wont click on that ads :p)

Hi Yellow,

Again, my thanks for all your help and patience with this... My apologies as I'm not to 'savvy' with exactly how Google or your SEO code work in detail. :huh:

As you mention, the gclid attibute is generated by Google (Adwords) and gets appended to the link to our website/product page.

Normally this attribute takes the form of:

http://www.site.com/catalog/product.html?gclid=bunchofrandomchars

In the footer of our site is the Google analytics code which monitors the traffic to our site. This code (I imagine embedded in the ga.js Javascript) reads the URL and finds the gclid attribute. If can then report back to Google that someone came to our site by clicking on a specific Adwords ad.

However, if an SEO mod is changing the attribute in the URL to:
http://www.site.com/catalog/product.html/gclid/bunchofrandomchars

... would the ga.js code have trouble reading the gclid variable?

This is where my understanding of your mod weakens... when the original link is passed to our site, does the SEO mod change the URL immediately, or would the GA code see the original URL (and any passed variables) without modification?

I guess you are correct when you say that if the link is created by Google, it should be able to understand it. Except that the link is being modified from it's original format to the new 'SEO friendly' format. Maybe Google can't understand it anymore?

Interesting link with some info is here.

In any case, here's a few keywords for you to try... I'll give you the ones which tend to appear most often in the USA:

1. microbead
2. bugle beads
3. seed beads
4. Craft Organizer

Thanks for your help and I hope you're doing ok there in Houston. (I heard that it may be 4 weeks for some people to get power back?!) :(

Best regards,
Chris

Hi Yellow,

OK. I think I got it working. Made the following change to your mod.

File: init_ssu.php
Location: /includes/init_includes

Line 330 (approx) look for:

$params .= (isset($_SESSION['languages_code']) && strpos($params, 'language/') === false && $_SESSION['languages_code'] != DEFAULT_LANGUAGE) ? '/language/' . $_SESSION['languages_code'] : '';

Insert after above:

// Check if Adwords auto-tagging variable has been passed and keep it if it has
if (strpos($params, '/gclid/') !== false) {
     $params = str_replace('/gclid/', '?gclid=', $params);
}

Seems to be working so far... I'll check the results over the next few days and confirm...

Thanks!
Chris

Nice fix. Let me know if that works, I will incorporate that in the new version

Regards

yellow1912:

Nice fix. Let me know if that works, I will incorporate that in the new version

Regards

Well... don't need to wait a few days to confirm. It's definitely working now. Yay!

Thanks again for your support and for a great mod!

I look forward to your new version and the Link Alias feature...

Take care,
Chris

yellow1912:

Okie, dont add .html, add html only

No dot added when I tried this and still not bringing up the product pages, just the main page.

hi, yellow

thank you for your great add-on!

problem: some of links appear as below and thus fall in bad request
http://www.example.com/store/product_reviews_info/%s/reviews_id/1

why and how to deal?

regards,
David

@MikeyG & ptnan: There is an update posted a couple posts above, not in the upload section yet. That should fix both problem.
http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showpost.php?p=610847&postcount=614

Now, there is one problem reported earlier, where accessing a link to a (wrong) category link can cause a problem.
Example:
http://demo.rubikintegration.com/zencart/test-attrib-c-25
http://demo.rubikintegration.com/zencart/test-attrib-c-25xxx

If you feel adventurous, you can use this new version of includes/init_includest/init_ssu.php

Please note that this version does not include the fix for glid yet, since Im considering the affect that fix may have on links with zenid, and I'm trying various options for that.

hi, yellow

thanks for your prompt reply and helpful links

i've just download the updated version and so far so good:P

best regards,
David

Yellow,
I have set up the online test site and it is on a top level domain, to mimic exactly what is going on in the important site.
http://www.tecrealtor.com/
SSU is turned on.
You can go to any product and click on a color attribute, the popup works but no image shows up.
Compare this with the real site in the sig., there is no SSU installed there.
Also, when turning SSU off in Admin the images are back, if you need me to do this, just give me a holler in this forum and I will turn SSU off in the test site.
Again, lest you forget, here is the URL to the mod that pops up the js window:
http://www.zen-cart.com/index.php?main_page=product_contrib_info&products_id=616
Many thanks.

First thing you may need to check:

Here is part of the popup js:
images//large/attributes/R126H_LRG.jpg

Notice how you have 2 // right there?

@ckosloff:

Also, in includes\templates\template_default\jscript_dynamic_window_popup.js

Find this line:
writeln('<html><head><title>Loading...</title><style>body{margin-bottom:32px;margin-left:8px;margin-right:8px;margin-top:8px;font-family:tahoma, arial, helvetica, Geneva, sans-serif;}</style>');writeln('<sc'+'ript>');

Replace by:
writeln('<html><head><base href="<?php echo (($request_type == 'SSL') ? HTTPS_SERVER . DIR_WS_HTTPS_CATALOG : HTTP_SERVER . DIR_WS_CATALOG ); ?>" /><title>Loading...</title><style>body{margin-bottom:32px;margin-left:8px;margin-right:8px;margin-top:8px;font-family:tahoma, arial, helvetica, Geneva, sans-serif;}</style>');writeln('<sc'+'ript>');

A testing version is now available for those who want to test on your local host, you can see the demo here:
http://demo.rubikintegration.com/zencart/

It addresses several issues:

1. SSU may not work properly in some cases with extension set to something other than blank.
2. SSU did not address linked products properly, for example you have 1 product belongs to 2 categories, then there should be 2 links depending on the cases.

An example:
Code:
http://demo.rubikintegration.com/zencart/big-linked-c-22/blade-runner-director-cut-linked-p-5

http://demo.rubikintegration.com/zencart/dvd-movies-science-fiction-c-3_11/blade-runner-director-cut-linked-p-5
Both links above point to the same product. In the old version, SSU will redirect the first link to the 2nd one, this behavior is not desired. This new version addresses such issue.
Attached Files
Simple SEO URL.zip (43.9 KB, 18 views)

Yellow should I do an update on this module now or wait. I notice you have updated it in the form.

If it is working for you with no problem at all, I suggest you wait till a stable version comes out, which will be some time in the next 1-2 weeks.
For example, if you do not use extension and you currently do not have linked products, then the update wont do you any good.

If you do encounter certain problems, you may want to list them here first and then I can tell you if upgrading will fix those problems

Regards

yellow1912: hey I'm impressed with this mod so far! You're the only developer using a sound methodology that can deliver any URL needed. I only had to look at your .HTACCESS to know this. I look forward to installing & using this mod.

yellow1912:

First thing you may need to check:

Here is part of the popup js:
images//large/attributes/R126H_LRG.jpg

Notice how you have 2 // right there?
yellow,
thanks for fast support.
The use of the double trailing slash had already been discussed in the thread for that mod and found to be benign.
Anyway, I deleted that extra slash in the path.
Also, modified the js according to your instructions.
Results are that in the local site I still get same error, whereas in the online test site I get no popup window at all.
Please help, I want to use your contrib.
Thanks.

If this is a testing server, may I have the access to the ftp to make some changes for testing? If so please pm me your ftp info.

Regards

Raine

ckosloff:

yellow,
thanks for fast support.
The use of the double trailing slash had already been discussed in the thread for that mod and found to be benign.
Anyway, I deleted that extra slash in the path.
Also, modified the js according to your instructions.
Results are that in the local site I still get same error, whereas in the online test site I get no popup window at all.
Please help, I want to use your contrib.
Thanks.

I hope you're still planning on getting rid of category & product numbers in the URL unless it's specifically part of the category name. About slashes, I thought it was always best to force trailing slashes everywhere & go extensionless (no .html, just a trailing slash).

I can't get the mod working yet.

/cSSU_ID_DELIMITER65
``` <--i have dead links like this when I click on pages.

I get each of these errors respectively when I try to reset the cache:

Error cache/ssu folder is not writable
Warning Could not open dir DIR_FS_SQL_CACHE/ssu/
Error cache/ssu folder is not writable
Warning Could not open dir DIR_FS_SQL_CACHE/ssu/categories/
Error cache/ssu folder is not writable
Warning Could not open dir DIR_FS_SQL_CACHE/ssu/pc/

DIR_FS_SQL_CACHE is defined, but it doesn't seem to pick up the definition or something strange...

The names are not unique, and so id cant be gotten rid of

Real life example: why do we have ID number? Because each person does not have a unique name.

Regards

PS: there is a way to get rid of the numbers in this case, but you have to make very sure that category names and product names are unique. And since this may cause too much headache for store owner with thousands of products, it's not very practical.

yellow1912:

The names are not unique, and so id cant be gotten rid of

Real life example: why do we have ID number? Because each person does not have a unique name.

Regards

PS: there is a way to get rid of the numbers in this case, but you have to make very sure that category names and product names are unique. And since this may cause too much headache for store owner with thousands of products, it's not very practical.

at least in the case of my store, the final URLs are all unique, although categories within the URLs may sometimes overlap.

I think the solution is just a simple table of URLs, the respective internal zen cart URL and the clean/ modified URL.

I would rather have the small headache of making sure things are unique, vs ugly URLs. That's my own choice, and I'm going to search for a mod that does this properly, or modify/ hack one as needed for my own purpose.

Either that, or I wont bother with SEO urls all together. If I can't get them perfect, why bother until someone develops a mod that does things just right.

By the way, I still can't get this mod working for the clear cache function (see my error above).

Everything else functions perfect for me/ as designed.

DIR_FS_SQL_CACHE is in admin/includes/configure.php

This is the first time I have seen an error like this actually.

If you are going to hack it, you will also run into this situation:

SSU redirects the link if the name of product or category is wrong (either misspelled, or if the name has been changed recently). It all relies on the id goes with the name, I wonder how will you solve this problem.

I have not seen any such module, or any framework that uses name only, and if there is I wonder how they handle such cases.

An example of the use of seo url on another framework:
http://www.searchenginejournal.com/seo-friendly-url-structure/4556/