re-direct domain.com/index.php to domain.com

haggisv · Post by **haggisv** » Thu Feb 16, 2012 4:44 am

For SEO reasons it's better not to have a homepage at both domain.com and domain.com/index, but just have one or the other. phpbb seems to internally use the domain.com/index.php, but most external links (many of which you don't have control over) tend to point to just domain.com.

What's the easiest way to resolve this?

Peter77sx · Post by **Peter77sx** » Thu Feb 16, 2012 8:22 am

You can use Canonical URL to let the major search engines know which one you prefer.
A nice MOD for this is here http://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/mod/canonical_url/ also works with your forum's pages viewtopic, viewforum. simple and light.

/a3 · Post by **/a3** » Thu Feb 16, 2012 9:56 am

You could also do the following:

Open includes/functions.php
FIND:

Code: Select all

'U_INDEX'				=> append_sid("{$phpbb_root_path}index.$phpEx"),

REPLACE WITH:

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'U_INDEX'				=> append_sid($phpbb_root_path),

That means the board will always link to / instead of /index.php.

Also, if you have access to .htaccess you could change the default directory to /index2.php instead of /index.php, and then make /index.php redirect to /. So that way all board index links in the future will redirect to /.

In .htaccess, do something like:

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DirectoryIndex index2.php index.htm index.html

And in /index2.php use the following:

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<?php
/* no point in doing anything too complicated! */
$phpbb_root_path = './';
header('HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently');
header('Location: ' . $phpbb_root_path);
?>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<title>Page Moved</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Page Moved</h1>
<p>This page has been moved! Go to the <a href="<?php echo $phpbb_root_path; ?>">Board Index</a>.</p>
</body>
</html>

haggisv · Post by **haggisv** » Fri Feb 17, 2012 12:23 am

Thanks a lot guys, I will try that!

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