Rel canonical or 301 the Index Page?

[bozzie311]

Still a bit confused on best practice for /index.php showing up as duplicate for www.mysite.com. What do I need to do and How?

[Marcus_Miller]

Add a canonical URL of www.mysite.com to the homepage (/ & /index.php) & 301 redirect www.mysite.com/index.php to www.mysite.com

That covers both bases and will see the content indexed on the correct page before too long.

Cheers
Marcus

[StalkerB]

Probably the simplest way is to put this in your .htaccess file

RewriteEngine On Options +FollowSymLinks

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example.com
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^.*/index.html
RewriteRule ^(.*)index.html$ http://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

For reference the .htaccess file goes in the root of your domain via whatever file transfer program you use and of course replace example.com with your domain

This also makes sure the non-www redirects to the www.

If you get stuck, let me know

[bozzie311]

so just adding this in should work too right?

redirect 301 /index.php http://www.mysite.com/

I have this already:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^mysite.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.mysite.com/$1 [L,R=301]

[StalkerB]

Theoretically should work; you can quickly try it to see and change it back if it doesn't work

Doing it your way I've had sites fall over a few times (white page of death), but changing it back fixes things in no time.

[Marcus_Miller]

You do get small variations in how the server wants the htaccess but give it a go and see if it works.

If you are happy it is working in the browser then there is a free bit of software called webbug that will let you see the HTTP headers to ensure you are getting the 301 permanent redirect returned.

Hope it helps.

[CPU]

I would recommend Barry's original solution as not only does it fix the issue you mentioned, it takes care of a couple of other potential duplicate content issues (slashes elsewhere and www vs non-www)

Marcus's solution should be fine if want to fix the one issue on the single page.mentioned.

[KeriMorgret]

Hi! I'm following up on older questions, and wondering if you got this straightened out or still need a hand. Thanks!