migrating site from jsp to php .. search engine issues

ChicoMendez

hi im migrating a site from jsp to php.
suppose some one searches in google for something and come across this site.
how long will google and the like keep the references for my jsp pages.

what is the best way to combat the issue that those pages no longer exist.... leave the jsps and put a redirect to the corresponding php????

tnx

dahamsta

Yes. Alternatively, if you're using Apache and the filenames are identical bar the extension, remap the URL's using mod_rewrite:

(In the relevant VirtualHost...)

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule (.+).jsp$ $1.php

adam

ChicoMendez

my site is hosted by a hosting company... before asking them can you tell
is that change made by me or the host??
of can it be made at all as its a shared server??

dahamsta

Depends on whether your account is a "virtual host" or a "virtual server". If you have root shell access it's a virtual server, and yes, you can make that change (prolly in /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf). If not, try placing the code above in a .htaccess file in the DocumentRoot of your website and see what happens. (If the site is live, copy a few JSP and PHP files into a temporary directory and try it there.

Another option is to have PHP parse JSP files, again in httpd.conf or .htaccess:

AddType application/x-httpd-php .php .jsp

adam

mneylon

You could also use a redirect in .htaccess , but this would depend on your host

ConsultClifford

blacknight,
i have that exact issue also... ill be migrating a jsp site to php shortly... and its hosted with you.
do i have access to .htaccess ?

tnx

mneylon

Originally posted by ConsultClifford
blacknight,
i have that exact issue also... ill be migrating a jsp site to php shortly... and its hosted with you.
do i have access to .htaccess ?

tnx

In a word - YES

If you have any issues with directives let us know.

ChicoMendez

ill have to check with my host also.

however does this redirect you guys mention mean that if i try to access www.foo.com/test.jsp then it will actually give me www.foo.com/test.php

tnx

mneylon

You can do either

It depends on what you want to do.
If you use a nice bit of Apache's mod_rewrite you can even do it so that the visitor is completely oblivious to the change

dahamsta

The RewriteRule above will do it transparently. If you want to make it obvious, add " [L,R]" (minus the quotes) to the end of the RewriteRule.

adam

ChicoMendez

after reading some other threads ie. that naming html files descriptively is very good practice for search engines(is this true?)....

i think i will not only be changing the jsp to php but for several files i will rename them. is it true therefore that much of what we ve said goes out the window... as if someone searches for foo.jsp but now its foodescription.php our redirects will do nothing!

can we basically do some sort of redirect saying if the user requests any jsp page they re direct them to the index.php

mneylon

Yes.

For example, we converted our entire site to php about 18 months ago (maybe more), but as the search engines had indexed all the .html pages we put a .htaccess redirect

dahamsta

RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule .+\.jsp$ / [L,R]

ChicoMendez

tnx alot
btw what does shell access really mean?

dahamsta

Means you get to ssh or telnet into the machine, like the command prompt in Windows.

adam

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

dahamsta

Originally posted by daveirl
if you do a rewrite does google drop the old address from the index, or do you have to do redirect 301 to do that?

We never know what Google does. However Apache sends a 302 (Moved Temporarily) if the RewriteRule is followed by an [R] flag, so it's probably better to use [R=301] and cross your fingers.

If you don't send an R flag, Google will get a 200 and won't see any difference.

adam

ConsultClifford

could anyone gimme a link where i can go to learn about ssh so i can sort this thing out?

cheers

mneylon

Originally posted by ConsultClifford
could anyone gimme a link where i can go to learn about ssh so i can sort this thing out?

cheers

What do you need to know?

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=unix+commands - common commands

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/ - windows client

Karoma

i'm going a little off topic,sorry. but,..
why are you changing from jsp to php?

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