Hi guys. I've been wrestling with fancy URLs in Drigg and Drupal, and have finally found a smooth, site-wide solution.

My problems began when I realized the following:

  • "Action" requests on URL aliases don't work. Eg: /some-category/a-scoop-title/edit
  • The current method that Drigg uses for storing and translating scoop URL aliases is incompatible with modules that use the standard Drupal URL aliases.
  • Search engines will find duplicate content because scoops, stories, pages, etc are accessible from 2 locations: the original URL (Eg: /node/123), and the URL alias (Eg: /some-category/a-scoop-title).

As it turns out, the solution to the problems above is quite easy.

Rather than putting rewrite functions in settings.php , one should install and configure the following modules:

  • Pathauto: This will automatically generate "clean URL" aliases for new nodes. Eg: /some-category/a-scoop-title
  • URL Alter: This is needed by the Sub-Path URL Aliasing module.
  • Sub-Path URL Aliasing: This will allow "action" requests to URL aliases. Eg: /some-category/a-scoop-title/edit

And if you care about SEO, the Global Redirect module will prevent duplicate content by redirecting URLs such as /node/123 to the node's corresponding URL alias.

What do you think?
Nick
SoftCom, Inc.
http://softcom.com

Comments

nickhoffman’s picture

nickhoffman commented

BTW, the Token module is required by the Pathauto module.

nickhoffman’s picture

nickhoffman commented

BTW, in my original post,

Rather than putting rewrite functions in settings.php

means that you should not put the contents of sites/all/modules/drigg/custom_url_rewrite_function.php into settings.php . Instead, you rely upon the listed modules to provide URL aliasing functionality.

mercmobily’s picture

mercmobily commented
Status: Needs review » Fixed

Hi,

There are reasons why I ended up opting for the global aliasing.
Amongst them:

1) If a note changes its category, I want to be able to still reach that node. Right now, it doesn't _actually_ matter which category the node is in -- it will still be found regardless

2) If a node is in an "unrecognised" section, it will be given "All" which is nice

3) It doesn't require configuration. I can tell new users who are not used to Drupal "It works". Any other way requires both installing and configuring external modules.

Now, as of your problems:

* "Action" requests on URL aliases don't work. Eg: /some-category/a-scoop-title/edit

...? Are you sure? I am asking the question because right now that's exactly what should happen -- and what happens in every site I manage...

* The current method that Drigg uses for storing and translating scoop URL aliases is incompatible with modules that use the standard Drupal URL aliases.

This is true.

* Search engines will find duplicate content because scoops, stories, pages, etc are accessible from 2 locations: the original URL (Eg: /node/123), and the URL alias (Eg: /some-category/a-scoop-title).

This is another non-problem: with "my" method, /node/123 is _never_ _ever_ _ever_ linked from _anywhere_ on your site. So, Google (or any search engine) has no way to get to it.

I think I would much rather leave it the way things are right now, and leave people who know Drupal to make an informed decision if they want something more drupal-ish in terms of aliasing.

Bye!

Merc.

Status: Fixed » Closed (fixed)

Automatically closed -- issue fixed for 2 weeks with no activity.