Will a robots.txt disallow apply to a 301ed URL?
-
Hi there,
I have a robots.txt query which I haven't tried before and as we're nearing a big time for sales, I'm hesitant to just roll out to live!
Say for example, in my robots.txt I disallow the URL 'example1.html'.
In reality, 'example1.html' 301s/302s to 'example2.html'. Would the robots.txt directive also apply to 'example2.html' (disallow) or as it's a separate URL, would the directive be ignored as it's not valid?
I have a feeling that as it's a separate URL, the robots disallow directive won't apply. However, just thought I'd sense-check with the community.
-
I would that the example2.html wouldn't be affected by the robots.txt as it can be that a bot will visit example2.html directly without visiting example1.html. Definitely as it could be that the page was picked up after the first time it visited example1.html.
-
I would have to agree, using your example if example1.html is blocked via robots.txt and when you visit it, it 301's to example2.html then it's not blocked by robots. as long as example2.html is discoverable via other indexed pages linking to it.
Does anyone else in the community have some insight they would like to share?
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Disallowing URL Parameters vs. Canonicalizing
Hi all, I have a client that has a unique search setup. So they have Region pages (/state/city). We want these indexed and are using self-referential canonicals. They also have a search function that emulates the look of the Region pages. When you search for, say, Los Angeles, the URL changes to _/search/los+angeles _and looks exactly like /ca/los-angeles. These search URLs can also have parameters (/search/los+angeles?age=over-2&time[]=part-time), which we obviously don't want indexed. Right now my concern is how best to ensure the /search pages don't get indexed and we don't get hit with duplicate content penalties. The options are this: Self-referential canonicals for the Region pages, and disallow everything after the second slash in /search/ (so the main search page is indexed) Self-referential canonicals for the Region pages, and write a rule that automatically canonicalizes all other search pages to /search. Potential Concern: /search/ URLs are created even with misspellings. Thanks!
Technical SEO | | Alces1 -
International URL Structures
Hi everyone! I've read a bunch of articles on the topic, but I can't seem to be able to figure out a solution that works for the specific case. We are creating a site for a service agency, this agency has offices around the world - the site has a global version (in English/French & Spanish) and some country specific versions. Here is where it gets tricky: in some countries, each office has a different version of the site and since we have Canada for example we have a French and an English version of the site. For cost and maintenance reason, we want to have a single domain : www.example.com We want to be able to indicate via Search Console that each subdomain is attached to a different country, but how should we go about it. I've seen some examples with subfolders like this: Global FR : www.example.com/fr-GL Canada FR: www.example.com/fr-ca France: www.example.com/fr-fr Does this work? It seems to make more sense to use : **Subdirectories with gTLDs, **but I'm not sure how that would work to indicate the difference between my French Global version vs. France site. Global FR : www.example.com/fr France : www.example.com/fr/fr Am I going about this the right way, I feel the more I dig into the issue, the less it seems there is a good solution available to indicate to Google which version of my site is geo-targeted to each country. Thanks in advance!
Technical SEO | | sarahcoutu150 -
How to stop robots.txt restricting access to sitemap?
I'm working on a site right now and having an issue with the robots.txt file restricting access to the sitemap - with no web dev to help, I'm wondering how I can fix the issue myself? The robots.txt page shows User-agent: * Disallow: / And then sitemap: with the correct sitemap link
Technical SEO | | Ad-Rank0 -
Trailing Slashes on URLs
Hi everyone I have a question on trailing slashes in URL. The crux of it is this: is having both: example.com/subdirectory/ and: example.com/subdirectory on all of your subdirectories considered duplicate content by Google - or in some other way really bad? We have done a heck a lot of research into this, and it would seem...no one knows for sure (it is easy to get lost in a sea of Webmaster tool forums from 2012). Google itself has both URLs for it's subdirectories (try https://www.google.co.uk/maps and https://www.google.co.uk/maps/) as does Moz; and yet there are some rumblings on the internet of people who think you must put a 'redirect' (although not really a redirect as it isn't a 301) in your htaccess file to one or the other (so for example.com/subdirectory/ would 'forward' to example.com/subdirectory); and this is what bbc.co.uk do. We tried putting this htaccess 'forward' in as an experiment, but I noticed our site then stopped being fully crawled by Google bot, so we reversed it. Can any one shed any light?
Technical SEO | | NickOrbital0 -
What's wrong with this robots.txt
Hi. really struggling with the robots.txt file
Technical SEO | | Leonie-Kramer
this is it: User-agent: *
Disallow: /product/ #old sitemap
Disallow: /media/name.xml When testing in w3c.org everything looks good, testing is okay, but when uploading it to the server, Google webmaster tools gives 3 errors. Checked it with my collegue we both don't know what's wrong. Can someone take a look at this and give me the solution.
Thanx in advance! Leonie1 -
Robots.txt issue - site resubmission needed?
We recently had an issue when a load of new files were transferred from our dev server to the live site, which unfortunately included the dev site's robots.txt file which had a disallow:/ instruction. Bad! Luckily I spotted it quickly and the file has been replaced. The extent of the damage seems to be that some descriptions aren't displaying and we're getting a message about robots.txt in the SERPs for a few keywords. I've done a site: search and generally it seems to be OK for 99% of our pages. Our positions don't seem to be affected right now but obviously it's not great for the CTRs on those keywords affected. My question is whether there is anything I can do to bring the updated robots.txt file to Google's attention? Or should we just wait and sit it out? Thanks in advance for your answers!
Technical SEO | | GBC0 -
Robots.txt Sitemap with Relative Path
Hi Everyone, In robots.txt, can the sitemap be indicated with a relative path? I'm trying to roll out a robots file to ~200 websites, and they all have the same relative path for a sitemap but each is hosted on its own domain. Basically I'm trying to avoid needing to create 200 different robots.txt files just to change the domain. If I do need to do that, though, is there an easier way than just trudging through it?
Technical SEO | | MRCSearch0 -
Use of Robots.txt file on a job site
We are performing SEO on a large niche Job Board. My question revolves around the thought of no following all the actual job postings from their clients as they only last for 30 to 60 days. Anybody have any idea on the best way to handle this?
Technical SEO | | WebTalent0