Can you 404 any forms of URL?

[Ideas-Money-Art]

Hi seomozzers,

<colgroup><col width="548"></colgroup>
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F256%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F258%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F242%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F257%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F260%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F225%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F251%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F176%23comment-form |

These are duplicate content and the canonical version is: http://www.ex.com/user (login and pass page of the website)

Since there were multiple other duplicates which mostly have been resolved by 301s, I figured that all "LOGIN" URLs (above) should be 404d since they don't carry any authority and 301 those wouldn't be the best solution since "too many 301s" can slow down the website speed.

But a member of the dev team said:

"Looks like all the urls requested to '404 redirect' are actually the same page http://ex.com/user/login. The only part of the url that changes is the variables after the "?" . I don't think you can (or highly not recommended) make 404 pages display for variables in a url. "

So my question is: I am not sure what he means by that? and Is it really better to not 404 these?

Thanks

[Copstead]

Instead of trying to 404 those, I would suggest utilizing GWT (Google Webmaster Tools) and use their "URL Parameters".  This will allow you to tell Google not to index all of them.

Log into GWT, under "Site configuration" select "URL paremters".

[Ideas-Money-Art]

Thanks Brent:)

But can you tell me why this wouldn't be good to 404? what is the reason behind that statement?

Thanks

[jim_cetin]

Drupal and Logintoboggan is maybe not configured correctly. It seems that cleanurls is not setup as well.

Maybe that will solve your issues?

[Copstead]

Are they actual not found pages?  If not then I wouldn't 404 them, and I have never tried to 404 parameters.

Also, I would make sure you setup a rel=canonical tag.  This will also help with the duplicates.

[Dr-Pete]

I would either go with parameter blocking or META NOINDEX this page (that's probably a bit more effective). It would be better to block it from Google than to 404 100s of variants, as you could see a spike in 404s and that can cause some problems.

Sorry, edited this - you don't want to 404 the login pages, because that's going to return a 404 for visitors as well, and the pages won't function properly. You want to just keep this away from the bots.

[Ideas-Money-Art]

Hey Brent,

For Rel=canonical

I should insert this tag:

rel="canonical" href="http://www.ex.com/user/login" />

in each of these pages

| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F256%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F258%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F242%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F257%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F260%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F225%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F251%23comment-form |
| http://ex.com/user/login?destination=comment%2Freply%2F176%23comment-form |

Is that correct?

Thanks

[Copstead]

I believe all you have to do is put this tag

On the main login page (should be the same url) and it will cover all variations.

If you aren't sure, go ahead and add it then view the source code of  the pages above to see if they all have the same rel=canonical tag.

[Ideas-Money-Art]

Thanks Brent,

Interesting, I thought you would put the canonical version of the URL on all duplicates. Have you done it before?

[Ideas-Money-Art]

Hi Dr.Peter,

Thanks for this great suggestion but could you tell me if the canonical would be a solution and if yes, could you tell me if my answer to Brent is right?

Thanks

[Copstead]

I believe this file is the base template for all the others.  So if you put it on the main one, it should be on the others.  That is why I suggested to add it and then view the code of the others to verify it is there as well.