Apache Rewrite to remove page name extensions

[TRICORSystems]

If I use Apache Rewrite to remove my file extensions from my pages will Google view those pages as new? Do I have to also 301 redirect from the "page-name.htm" to "page-name"?

I'd like to change my pages from html to php to make my life a little easier but I'm worried about losing link juice if I were to 301 on every page.

Thanks

-Brandon

[Yanbo]

Hi,

As stated here

http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/redirection

Using 301 redirect will preserve over 90% of your link juice. Give Google some time and it should pick up new page locations depending on your crawl rate.

As for seeing pages as new content, based on my short experience there is a period where Google will display new urls as new pages, but after a while he will realize that they have just moved. I'm not sure if there is a way to avoid this.

Kind regards

[TRICORSystems]

Hi Bojan,

One thought I had was to create new php pages, keeping the same page name but using Apache to Rewrite the php to htm.

Any thoughts on this as an option?

-Brandon

[Yanbo]

Sounds good to me, but I prefer page names without extension.

You won't need 301 then, since you will keep old URLs and there won't be that short period of time when Google might possible see "duplicate" pages.

If you need help with Apache configuration let me know.

Kind regards

Bojan

[TRICORSystems]

Great!

Thanks, I may take you up on that!

-Brandon