Questions
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Issues with Moz producing 404 Errors from sitemap.xml files recently.
Hi Barb, I am sure Joel will chime in also but just to clarify that it is probably not the utf8 encoding or lack of it that is causing the issue. At least with the sitemap urls it is simply the formatting of the xml that is being produced. As to if the other errors you are seeing are caused by the same kind of thing, if you are seeing references to the same encoded characters (%0A%09%) then the answer is most likely yes. So the issue is not utf8 encoding related (there are plenty of non utf8 encoded sites on the web still!) but how the moz crawler is reading your links and if other tools/systems will be having the same troubles. Have you looked in google webmaster tools to see if it reports similar 404 errors from the sitemap or elsewhere? If you see similar errors in GWT then the issue is likely not restricted to the moz crawler only. Beyond that, since for the sitemap at least the fix should be relatively simple and quite possibly the other moz errors you see will also be able to be fixed easily by making small adjustments to the templates and removing the extra line breaks/tabs which are creating the issue then it is worth doing so that these errors are removed and you can concentrate on the 'real' errors without all the noise.
Moz Pro | | LynnPatchett0