Creating A Sitemap.xml file for an https site query.

[DavidZA1]

Hi Guys

I would like to know what is best practices when creating a sitemal.xml file for an https site.

Should I create one with http urls in it or one with https urls in it.

My website does redirect from http to https.

Also in the robots.txt file should i reference my sitemap file location with http or https?

For example: sitemap: http://www.example.co.za/sitemap.xml / sitemap: https://www.example.co.za/sitemap.xml ?

This is for a newly created site that still needs to be launched.

**If anybody could please get back to me on this I would appreciate it.

Thanks

Dave**

[shortsboy]

The important things are-

1. Be smart about the site structure:  to keep the engines from crawling and indexing HTTPS pages, structure the website so that HTTPs are only accessible through a form submission (log-in, sign-up, or payment pages). The common mistake is making these pages available via a standard link (happens when you are either ignorant or  not aware that the secure version of the site is being crawled and indexed).
2. Use Robots.txt file to control which pages will be crawled and indexed
3. Use.htaccess file. Here’s how to do this:
4. Create a file names robots_ssl.txt in your root.
5. Add the following code to your .htaccessRewriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} 443 [NC]RewriteRule ^robots.txt$ robots_ssl.txt [L]
6. Remove yourdomain.com:443 from the webmaster tools if the pages have already been crawled
7. For dynamic pages like php, try< ?phpif ($_SERVER["SERVER_PORT"] == 443){echo “< meta name=” robots ” content=” noindex,nofollow ” > “;}?>
8. Dramatic solution (may not always be possible): 301 redirect the HTTPS pages to the HTTP pages – with hopes that the link juice will transfer over.

For more information please refer to this link :

http://www.seomoz.org/ugc/solving...

This answer is not my own but Harald Tschuggnall - http://www.seomoz.org/users/profile/370267

Read it and found it appropriate for your query.

Hope this helps.

[MoosaHemani]

Dave i am not sure why you are using the encrypted version of URLs that is https instead of http but if you using it there is no need to add http version in the sitemap... only add https URLs and submit the xml sitemap to Google website tools.

Personally I don’t see any need of adding xml sitemap’s URL in a robots.txt file as you are including xml sitemap to Google webmaster tool anyways...

[DavidZA1]

Thanks for the reply Moosa.

[G.Anderson]

Moosa,

I know this question was responded to last year but I am having a similar issue:

We have our homepage under SSL but other pages on the site are in regular http. When we submit the sitemap, should we include the https version of the homepage and then the regular http versions of the other pages?

Again, the whole site is NOT under SSL, so we just want to be sure there is consistency in the sitemap for googlebot to easily access all pages.

Thanks for any input.

-G

[RoxBrock]

I have the same issue as Moosa. I have a site where some pages (in Spanish) are https. The english pages are http. Can you tell me if it's okay to have both in the sitemap.xml?