@Mac,
I had to dig some for where I got the REL= possibilities. I made a list and let it go. SO I had to dig up the source. The process reminded of many of the things I learned when I did the initial research.
GooGle 2005 Data of use:
Link Relationships
The CONTENTS comes from this
page. They point out CONTENTS START is a popular choice too.
Another aspect of linking is reverse linking automatically that allows one to link back as well as drill down. I’m behind on digging into this tech and how Goole/Yahoo are using it. But, I’ve seen posts of mine in Google before I finished typing them. It is disconcerting to be working in a draft in WordPress and doing research that turns up your in progress writting in a search.
Pingback
The re-look at REV= use also reminded me that REV is omitted from the HTML 5 spec. It is to be replaced with REL=.
The HTML 5 spec for REL= has a smaller list
here.
The current list of Link Types is being constructed here:
REL Extentions.
Exactly how Google is using these REL values is foggy at best. One of my SEO news letter suggests that using these is helping placement but it remains a bit iffy. I think they are worthwhile and I’ve seen some improvement after their addition to some sites.
Google stated some intent and information in their
Webmaster Tools. This is a 20 minute video about the use of rel=canonical which shows they are looking at REL elements. It reminded me the
link element using canonical is important in cleaning up incoming links that are inconsistent, which helps search engines avoid classing the same page a duplicate content under various URL’s and degrading rakings.
Code: Select all
<link rel="canonical" href="http://forums.openuru.org/index.php" />
Adding the above to the page header so that it appears only on the board index would be good. But, it is another pesky ongoing change. If it is easy, go for it. If not skip it.
Code: Select all
<link rel="canonical" href="http://openuru.org/" />
Would be good to add to the sites home landing page.
If you skip the video, these elements are to fix incoming links that add or omit ‘www’. They correct capitalization differences and other inconsistencies in incoming links. That allows the search engines to know what is and is not duplicate content. As far as Yahoo and Google are concerned
http://openuru.org/ and
http://www.openuru.org/ are two different pages. One of them will be considered duplicate content and depreciated in the rankings. This has lots of complex implications. Pick one or the other.
While Google and Yahoo do try to figure this out, they make mistakes. Save them the trouble.
The rel=”canonical” is for incoming links one cannot control. Links within the OU site should be consistent. If one is past that, not to worry use the REL and skip changing loads of links. The use of canonical should be page specific, a specific incoming URL to a specific page. That can be complex in a forum, wiki, and blog. So, be careful where one puts them. If in doubt, omit.
The URL you want avoided say
http://www.openuru.org/, should generate a redirect to the preferred URL. Whether that is a
PHP if statement covering:
Code: Select all
<?php
header ('HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently');
header ('Location: http://openuru.org/ ');
?>
…or a mod_rewrite is a matter of choice. See:
Redirection with mod_rewrite
Let me know if something is confusing… I tend to leave out pieces I forget others might not know.